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V;- '* '• - Ni::' 


BY MISS JENNIE M. DRINKWATER. 

♦ 

I. Tessa Wadsworth’s Discipline SI. 50 


II. Rue's Helps. ]2mo 1.50 

III. Electa. 12mo 1.50 

IV. Fifteen; or, Lydia’s Happenings 1.50 

V. Bek’s First Corner. 12mo 1.50 

--VI. Miss Prudence. 12mo 1.50 

— VH. The Story of Hannah. 12ino 1.50 

VHI. That Quisset House. 12mo 1.50 

IX. Isobel’s Betwe:en Times. 12mo 1.50 

X. Rizpah’s Heritage. 12mo 1.50 

XI. From Flax to Linen. 12mo 1.50 

XH. Other Folks. 12mo 1.50 

—XI 1 1. Fourfold. 12mo 1.50 

—XIV. Marigold. 12mo 1.50 

XV. Second Best. 12mo 1.50 


They are extremely well written, free from every taint of 
sensational trickery, yet so intensely interesting that the^' draw 
the reader gently on from page to" page with the attraction of 
earnestness, simplicity, and purity. 

While evincing qualities of originality and literary taste, and 
offering much to suggest genius, the author of this pleasing and 
thoroughly good fiction is entitled to high praise for especial 
cleverness in writing books which at once interest and at the 
same time instil into the heart a fine sense of life’s noblest con- 
cerns. Young ladies especially should read them. — Boston 
Critic. 

Miss Drinkwater introduces the reader to agreeable people, 
provides an atmosphere which is tonic and healthful, and en- 
lists interest in every page. — Sunday-School Times. 

It is one of the charms of Miss Urinkwater’s stories, their 
naturalness and homelikeness. — Methodist Protestant. 


BRADLEY AND WOODRUFF, Publishers, 
BOSTON. 


SECOND BEST 


BY 



JENNIE M. DRINKWATER N* 


AUTHOR OF “rue’s HELPS ” ; “ ELECTA ” ; “ FIFTEEN ” ; “ BEk’s FIRST 

corner”; “miss prudence”; “story of hannah”; “that 
QU issET house”; “ isobel’s between times”; “rizpah’s 
heritage”; “from flax to linen”; “four- 
fold”; “marigold”; “other folks,” 

ETC., ETC. 

“ Turn your face to God, and you have found the sunny side of life.” 

“ Then said his Lordship, ‘ Weel, God mend all.’ 

“ ‘ Nay, Donald, we must help Him to mend it,’ said the other.” 


Quoted by CarlyU. 



BOSTON 

BRADLEY & WOODRUFF 



•■'i. 


GT ^ ' 


Copyright, 1891, 

BY 


Bradley & Woodruff. 


DEDICATED 

TO 

MY LITTLE FRIENDS 

(Ella 

aiDa Cl)llD0 


FOR THEM TO GROW UP TO. 



% 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

I. Behind the Sofa 5 

11. On the Jump 23 

III. The Secret that should have been 

Told 63 

IV. The Letter that never was Mailed . . 79 

V. OsTERMOOR Point 88 

VI. The Other Side of her . 95 

VIL Somebody Else . 117 

VIIL Under the Pines . 136 

IX. In her Chamber , . 150 

X. Rachel Ennis 164 

XL Three Girls 190 

XIL On the Way to a Fixed Purpose . . . 203 

XIII. Three Stories 217 

XIV. The Night before 245 

XV. The Next Morning 282 

XVI. Snatches 288 

XVI L When it was Over 307 

XVI 11. Common-place . 319 



SECOND BEST. 


I. 

BEHIND THE SOFA. 

“ She is pretty to walk with, 

And witty to talk with, 

And pleasant, too, to think on.” 

— Sir John Suckling. 

Some things happen almost every year.” 

— French Proverb. 

School was so exciting that day. During the 
first hour she learned about utilizing old rivers, 
and whispered to Lulu Proctor that utilizing old 
things was one of the things she was living for: 
she had made her dress over herself. 

Lulu looked grave and would not answer. 
Rachel thought it was because she was transgress- 
ing by the whisper and became more absorbed 
than ever in the old rivers. 

Lulu did not care for the old rivers, she did not 
love books and study as Rachel Ennis loved them, 
and she had serious reason for looking grave and 


6 


SECOND BEST. 


not speaking when Rachel was comical about 
utilizing old things ; for last night her mother 
had received a letter from her father, who was in 
New York in the hospital with Rachel’s father, 
and he had written that Dr. Ennis could never 
recover his sight ; he would always be blind : 
“and he has saved very little, his old mother is 
nearly helpless, his wife is utterly incapable, his 
children young, — God pity him ! ” 

Lulu could not study. She drew a pretty, girl- 
ish figure on her slate, tall and graceful, like 
Rachel ; but Rachel did not lift her eyes from the 
large page spread out on her desk. She was 
learning that in California old river beds are 
mined for gold, — they had been covered up by 
volcanic rock that flowed over them ; and in Penn- 
sylvania the miner runs across muddy remains of 
carboniferous brooks. In Australia the old water- 
courses, hidden from sixty to eighty feet below the 
surface, are hunted for and found and mined for 
tin. These old tin streams were quite extensive 
and permanent. Small diamonds were found with 
the tin. They were mostly pale green and light 
straw color, of little value. 

And then the large book was laid aside, and 


BEHIND THE SOFA. 


7 


another opened, and she learned about the com- 
pass plant. It was found on prairies and plains, 
popularly called “pilot-weed.” It stands from 
three to six feet high ; and Indians and trappers 
are said to find their way in the dark, at night, by 
feeling of its leaves. When the leaves are young 
and small, the pointing to the north is unmistak- 
able. She drew Lulu’s attention to this ; but 
Lulu was draping her girl in the latest fashion, 
and would not look. Rachel gave her an impa- 
tient nudge, then lost herself in her book again. 

Lulu cared to keep her place at the head of the 
class : she did not see what ailed her. There was 
a plant growing in New Granada, known under 
the name of “ chanchi,” which yields a juice said 
to possess superior qualities as a writing ink. 
Letters made with it are first reddish, then turn 
to a deep black in a few hours : in the case of 
some papers, part of which were written with this 
vegetable juice and part with ordinary ink, after 
being long exposed to the action of sea water, the 
letters made with the juice came out clear, Avhile 
the others were almost illegible. Attempts had 
been made to cultivate it in other countries, but 
had signally failed. 


8 


SECOND BEST, 


The Five-Minute Talk that day, given by the 
English literature teacher, was another of the ex- 
citing events. The subject written on the black- 
board crowded the class-room : — 

“ I KNOW A GIRL ” — 

Looking into the eager, listening eyes. Miss Ellis 
began : — 

‘‘I KNOW A GIRL who hinders because she makes 
fun of people : she is quick, and has a bright way 
of saying sharp things, and her friends are amused 
and laugh. She loves the young people’s prayer- 
meeting. She is a Christian, but she is a hin- 
dering Christian. She is a hindrance in that 
meeting. Some of the young men hesitate about 
praying or speaking because Lucy is there, and 
they are sure that she will ‘ make fun ’ of some- 
thing they say. 

“ Some comical things are said. An old gentle- 
man came into the meeting one evening, and 
prayed earnestly, ‘Lord, make us a warning,’ 
when he meant an example. And another old 
man always opened his petitions, ‘Permitted as 
we air^ And one who could not read one word 
gave thanks for his talents. One young man 


BEHIND THE SOFA. 


9 


always read the same chapter, — the second of the 
Gospel of John, — and never failed to make the 
same mistake, ‘But the servants which drew the 
water knew the governor of the feast’ ; and it was 
a little amusing to hear every time how the ser- 
vants knew the governor. If you will read the 
ninth verse, you will understand how he made his 
mistake. Lucy had not courage to speak kindly 
of his mistake, and teach him how to give the 
sense in reading it ; but she had the humor and 
the thoughtlessness to make fun of it. And she 
is a brave little thing : she has prayed in the meet- 
ing herself. I am not sure that her prayers did 
any good to the people who were afraid of her 
fun-making tongue. 

“ How did Lucy get ready to hinder ? By say- 
ing every funny thing she could think of. How 
do you think I felt once when a schoolmate said 
to me, ‘ I never thought of making fun of people 
until I heard you do it every day’? 

“ Another girl I know hinders her influence for 
good by using slang. Yesterday she remarked, 
‘I swore I wouldn’t wear the red one, and I 
didn’t.’ But that is not slang : it is something 
worse. And Mollie, who united with the church 


10 


SECOND BEST. 


last spring, laughs and talks so loudly in the 
street that she attracts attention. Would any one 
who noticed her on the street be surprised to see 
her kneeling in prayer at night, or next Sabbath 
taking the bread and wine ? 

“ A young girl wrote a note to a friend, saying 
that she expected to ‘join the church’ at the next 
communion (‘ confess Christ ’ she meant, but could 
not quite say it), and the friend’s only comment 
was, ‘Well, I am surprised !’ What was it in her 
that hindered? Lightness, vanity, talking non- 
sense and seldom talking seriously, disrespect to 
her mother and disregard of her wishes, and a 
genera] air of selfishness. The friend did not see 
her tears and her prayers. 

“Girls, you hinder by giving your worst and 
keeping your best to yourselves. Every sullen 
look hinders, every cross, sharp, rude word, every 
disobedient action, every disregard of some one’s 
feelings, every silence when you should speak: 
keeping the mouth tight shut is sometimes as hin- 
dering as opening it too quickly; every time you 
think of yourself first hinders thinking of some 
one else first; every silly page you read hinders you 
from reading a wise page ; every feeling of hatred 


BEHIND THE SOFA. 


11 


and unforgiveness hinders; every deceit, every 
falsehood, every little selfishness, hinders your 
growth and spoils your influence for good ; every 
hour may hinder a day, and every day hinder a 
year, and a year of Idnderings may hinder the good 
of your whole lifetime. You hinder your father 
and your mother, your older and younger brothers 
and sisters; you hinder yourself from growing 
good; and, hardest of all, you hinder God. You 
hinder God from giving you good things. Your 
father may say, ‘ I wanted to give Mary music les- 
sons this year ; but she is not ready for it. She is 
idle. She will not practise.’ Mother says, ‘I 
wanted Anna to have a handsome suit ; but she is 
so careless I don’t feel like spending the money. 
She would not take good care of it. I must wait 
until she is older.’ But that means only ‘until 
she is careful.’ You see you do hinder father and 
mother from giving you good things. 

“Would your heart not ache if you should hear 
God say, ‘ I want to forgive Susie ; but she does 
not forgive some one, and her heart is so hard 
with bitterness and hatred that she is not ready 
for my forgiveness ’ ? Or, ‘ I want to answer her 
prayer and give her that good thing she is asking ; 


12 


SECOND BEST. 


but she would waste it, and she would not be 
thankful for it, and she would love that and not 
love the Giver ’ ? Or, ‘ I want to give her some- 
thing happy ; but she is so full of herself, and of 
thinking of herself, that I must send her pain to 
make her sympathetic and think about others ’ ? 

Not only do you hinder father and mother, but 
you make them so sorry. Not only do you hinder 
your loving and wise Father in heaven, but, oh, 
how you hurt and grieve him! You hinder the 
best thing in all his wide universe, — his will. Do 
you pray, ‘Thy will be done’? Then do not be 
selfish and thoughtless and wicked, and hinder his 
will being done. 

“ If there is anything in this ‘ Talk ’ that you 
do not understand, will you come to me and ask 
me to explain it ? 

“ Have you been hindering ten, twelve, fourteen 
years of your life ? Are you getting ready to hin- 
der more as you grow older and have more oppor- 
tunity ? I know a daughter who hinders her 
mother. She is grown up. What a hindering 
child she must have been ! And a wife who hin- 
ders her husband and her children. Every year 
she hinders more and more ; she is getting ready 


BEHIND THE SOFA. 


13 


to hinder more and more. If God asks you not to 
hinder any more, and promises to help you not to 
hinder, will you try all you can ? ” 

At noon Rachel and Lulu walked a block to- 
gether and then separated. Rachel’s home was 
in Park Street: it was a handsome house, — her 
mother could not be happy in a house that was 
not handsome. She ran up the steps, and Delia 
opened the door. Rachel was proud of her 
golden-haired, brown-eyed little sister. She gave 
her a loving touch on the head, and asked where 
Mint was. 

Mint had gone out with nurse, and mamma was 
upstairs, scolding and wringing her hands, and 
grandmother was scolding and crying. It was all 
about papa going to New York. ‘‘But she wanted 
him to go,” exclaimed Rachel, impatiently. 

“But she didn’t want him to stay blind, and 
never see to earn money for us any more,” re- 
turned Delia, deliberatingly. “ That is what she 
is scolding about. She is walking up and down and 
wishing you would come home, and says there is 
no one to depend on, and grandmother says some- 
body ought to have hindered it. Why didn’t 
you., Rachel?” questioned the child, with imploring, 
wide-awake eyes. 


14 


SECOND BEST. 


Rachel did not go upstairs to her mother. She 
went into the back parlor, and threw herself at 
full length upon the soft rug before the fire in the 
grate. Was her father 6 Would he always 
be blind? And he loved books so. Would he 
never see Delia’s hair and face again, and tell her 
how sweet she was? And would he never look 
at her w:ith his proud eyes, and say that she was 
strong and graceful, and that he loved strength 
and grace in a woman ? 

And when they went in the summer to the old 
house at The Foreside, could he not see the rocks 
and the water and the green islands? Couldn’t 
he care for her lessons any more ? 

“O father, father !” she sobbed, in hopelessness. 

A child’s step paused beside her, and the big 
brown eyes looked down in wonder. 

“ Must we go away and be poor? Mother says 
so. Grandmother says we have been extravagant 
and wasted money. Grandmother said it was 
mother’s fault. Have the doctors at the hospital 
taken father’s eyes out? What made Dr. Proctor 
let them do it ? Shall you go to school this after- 
noon.” 

“ No,” said Rachel, gathering herself together. 
“I don’t want ever to do anything again.” 


BEHIND THE SOFA, 


15 


Grandmother says somebody has got to be on 
‘ihe jump,” said the child, “ and there’s nobody 
likes jumping but you.” 

“ Rachel,” called a sharp voice at the head of the 
stairs, “ I want you.” 

With lingering steps, Rachel obeyed. 

‘‘ He’s managed wrong,” her mother was saying 
excitedly. 

“ He married wrong,” her grandmother retorted, 
in a tone that cut like steel. 

In an instant Rachel was on her mother’s side. 
She could not love her grandmother without try- 
ing, and she had never tried. 

“Never mind, mother ! ” she comforted, putting 
both young, strong arms about her mother. “You 
and I can do anything. We’ll show father that he 
has two pairs of open eyes to do things with. 
We’ll go out in the country and live in your 
house, and father will grow happy ; for he always 
liked the country, and you and I can row him 
about and amuse him.” 

“ That will not feed and clothe you all,” cried 
the grandmother. “ Who is to pay the bills ? ” 

Delia followed her sister. She stood beside her 
mother, hiding her face in the folds of her red 


16 


SECOND BEST. 


wrapper. She wished papa wasn’t blind, and that 
grandmother wouldn’t be so cross ; and Bridget 
said the oysters were as cold as a stone, and no- 
body was going to lunch. 

“Are you going back to school?” her mother 
asked. 

“No : not if I can do anything at home.” 

“It’s time you did something at home,” muttered 
the grandmother. “ Books and study have ruined 
your father and are in a fair way of ruining you.” 

Delia lifted her warm, red cheeks, and pulled 
her mother’s arm. 

“ The oysters are getting cold.” 

“Well, come to lunch, then. Rachel, bring up 
your grandmother’s. Father will be home to-mor- 
row, and we must not make him too miserable.” 

Bending, she took the flushed, troubled little 
face between her soft palms and kissed it. She 
loved her children, and she loved her husband; 
but she had never learned to be brave. 

“ Kissing and caressing is no way,” mumbled the 
harsh voice : “ it’s time to be hard not soft, and the 
girls have got to be spry. Mint isn’t anything, 
and never will be.” 

It was not in the grandmother’s nature to be 


BEHIND THE SOFA. 


17 


satisfied unless she were blaming somebody: it 
began some time ago — with Adam. 

“ That child would be better off in heaven.” 

Who wouldn’t be ? ” was Rachel’s quick reply. 
‘‘ Wouldn’t youl'' 

Rachel ! That’s disrespectful,” interposed her 
mother, gently. ‘‘Grandmother, will you have 
custard and an orange?” 

“No: I won’t have anything. Who’s to pay 
for my lunch. I’d like to know?” 

“Rachel, can’t youV^ whispered the child cling- 
ing to her mother’s arm. ^ 

“Oh, yes: 1 can do everything! ” cried Rachel, 
cheerily. “ We’ll go out in the country, and raise 
chickens, and churn, and have vacation all the year 
round. Mother, aren't you glad we have that 
place ? ” 

“Twenty acres and an old house will not feed 
and clothe us. You are all children together! 
And to think I have lived to see this day ! ” 
ejaculated the grandmother. 

“Do you wish you had died, grandmother?” 
Delia questioned in artless sincerity. 

“ I wish you would hold your tongue,” snapped 
the old woman, “and get me something to eat! 


18 


SECOND BEST. 


I’m faint with hunger and thirst, and the house 
has been upside down ever since Dr. Proctor’s 
letter came. Why didn’t your father come and 
tell us, and not set us in an uproar with a letter? 
It’s the doctors in the hospital that have done it, 
and I warned your father not to let them touch 
his eyes.” 

‘ Come,” said Rachel. 

Rachel’s mother sipped her oyster stew with 
evident relish, and asked Rachel what had hap- 
pened at school that day. Delia begged her to 
make a turban for her biggest doll, and nurse 
brought Mint to the table and fed him with bread 
and milk. He was nearly two years old, but he 
had not learned to use his hands. He could not 
direct the spoon to his lips. 

“ Poor baby ! ” said his mother, fondly. 

“Rachel, shan’t we have things now?” asked 
Delia, helping herself to an orange. 

It isn’t having things,” Rachel burst out : “ it is 
doing things that I want. Lulu is going to learn 
painting and drawing, and go to Rome, and come 
home and have a studio : her father says she may. 
She has done her little brother in crayon, and it’s 
splendid.” 


BEHIND THE SOFA. 


19 


‘‘Do you want to do Mint in crayon?” asked 
Delia, sucking her orange. 

But Rachel would not say what she wished to 
do. She prepared her grandmother’s lunch and 
took it upstairs, and then her impulse was to run, — 
to run fast and far, — and get away from all these 
dreadful things, and not see her father to-morrow, 
and not to have to hear her grandmother’s endless 
complaints, and not to know that her mother was 
helpless in trouble, and fretful. She was not fif- 
teen ; and her life had been as happy as her mother’s 
indulgence, her father’s pride in her, and the grati- 
fication of her tastes could render it. It had been 
so easy to be happy, and to love God for being so 
good to her. 

Every day she asked God, in penitence, to for- 
give her sins ; and she believed He did. She had 
a class in sewing-school every Saturday morning ; 
and she had formed a mission band among the 
girls at school. Every hour was filled with busy, 
happy work. 

She liked being a girl. She told the principal 
that morning that she liked being a girl better 
than anything. She would not be a woman until 
she was twenty-five. He had spoken her name as 


20 


SECOND BEST, 


she was crossing the school-room, and, when she 
went to him, he said: “I wanted to tell you that 
you are growing womanly: that is all.” 

She could read that afternoon ; she could always 
read. She would hide away with a book, and tell 
her mother that she must be alone awhile, and 
then would be left untroubled. The book was 
found, — a story-book, — and she hid herself behind 
the sofa in the front parlor. The sofa was placed 
between the fireplace and a window. As she sat 
with her back against the wall, the light fell on 
her book, the hiding-place was neither dark nor 
cramped, and she revelled in her security and 
leisure to finish the fascinating story. 

It was the story of a Jew, and how he found 
that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah of his 
people and the whole world. 

‘‘I believe in Jesus Christ,” she said, closing the 
book in the twilight. She had never said it before, 
never felt it before, never thought about it before. 

She had asked God ‘‘ for Christ’s sake ” to for- 
give her sins, without thinking whether or not 
Christ had anything to do with her sins or with 
her. 

From that hour Jesus Christ as God and man 


BEHIND THE SOFA. 


21 


was more to her than any one on earth or in 
heaven. As she grew, her love for Him and 
loyalty toward Him grew with the strength of 
her life. 

In all her life she never forgot how she said 
aloud, “I believe in Jesus Christ.” When the 
dinner-bell rang, she went down with the others. 
She was quiet, but no one thought of it. She had 
something new to live for : she had enough to live 
for all her life, — all her life on earth and in heaven. 
She had some one to tell about her father. Her 
first trust in her new faith was her father. 

She wrote a note to Lulu Proctor that evening. 
She told her that her father would always be 
blind. “I do not feel hopeless,” she wrote. ‘‘I 
can pray for him.” 

“ Let me see your note,” said her mother. 

She was shy with her mother. She handed her 
the closely written sheet reluctantly, stepping aside 
as her mother read it. Then, turning, she had a 
glimpse of her mother’s face : her bright, dark eyes 
were full of tears. 

An hour or two afterward, a neighbor from 
across the street rang the door-bell, and Delia 
brought her into the back parlor, where Rachel 


22 


SECOND BEST. 


and her mother were sitting at the table. She 
was an old lady, and Rachel always liked to watch 
her face communion Sundays. She slipped out, 
thinking her mother would feel less embarrassed if 
the old lady should question her ; but before she. 
had placed her foot on the stair she heard the 
sweet old voice say, — 

‘‘ I hope you are a Christian, my dear.” 

“It isn’t much of a comfort to me if I am,” was 
the sorrowful reply. 

Whether or not it were a “ comfort ” in the time 
that followed Rachel never knew. She was com- 
forted, if no one else in the house were. After 
her mother died, she had one happy thing to re- 
member. One day her mother was writing a letter, 
and, glancing down to lift a book from the table at 
which she wrote, her eyes caught these words: 
“ Tell Jesus about everything that troubles you.” 
It was strange — or was it not ? — that this mother 
and daughter had to learn to understand each 
other through words written to others. 


11 . 


ON THE JUMP. 

“ Home keeping youth have ever homely wits.” — Two Gentle- 
men of Verona. 

She had been “ doing things ” ten years since 
that last exciting day at school. Lnlu Proctor 
had been sent to Rome, and returned to have her 
studio. Rachel had been in her mother’s old home 
at ‘‘ The Foreside.” She had learned what she 
was “ for ” : she put it into three words that she 
loved, “His Willing Servant.” 

She was His, — that was her joy and safety. 
She was His servant, — that was her inspiration 
and strength. She was willing, — that was the 
bond that held her fast. He had made her willing 
by teaching her about Himself and giving her an 
absorbing love for her work that was more exciting 
than that day at school ; and He kept her willing 
through every hard hour that was not half so hard 
as lookers-on believed. 

Tlrree miles up The Foreside another girl was 
living and learning. She had left her girlhood 


24 


SECOND BEST, 


behind and was stepping into reluctant woman- 
hood. She had not learned what she was for. 
She had not been willing. Her will was self- 
will, and her way was her own way. She had 
been willing to learn to do, to be, to hold, and 
keep what she loved best. She had not thought 
very much about what God might love best. 
She was never at a loss as to what she herself 
loved best. Rachel Ennis had never heard the 
name of Leila Provost. She knew something 
good was coming to her, because she had asked 
for it, and she was willing to wait for it. She 
was as willing to wait as to serve : in this, also, 
God had made her willing. 

The thing Rachel asked for, with the confidence 
and simplicity of her childlike nature, was that one 
dollar, or two, might be added to her weekly in- 
come. Two dollars a week extra seemed so large 
a sum that she did not think of asking for three. 
It was an easy thing for God’s power to give ; but 
it might not be easy for His wisdom to give it to 
her just now : if it were, it would come ; but what 
had she to do about it ? 

While she was waiting she must do her best. 
She was content with second-best having, but not 


ON THE JUMP, 


25 


with second-best doing. Her life was so simple 
that she very soon learned what to do next. Grand- 
mother said Rachel was on the jump from morning 
till night, and that her thoughts came to her on 
the jump : they had to come on the jump to get to 
her. 

She was not on the jump at this moment, when 
you have your first glance at her. She was stand- 
ing perfectly still, in the middle of the room, as 
erect as a soldier on drill, with nothing at all in 
her hands : she usually had something in her 
hands. 

Your first impression of her would be that she 
was strong. She was tall, her shoulders were 
thrown back, her head well poised, her face was 
fresh and round, her blue eyes had no special 
beauty excepting the beauty of herself that looked 
through them, her fluffy, reddish-brown hair curled 
over her forehead and the top of her head; at 
the back of her head it was twisted into a loose 
knot. Her dress was dark calico: it had to be 
dark (and she loved light colors), because she 
had to wash and iron it herself, and two dresses 
a week in the wash for herself would be unpar- 
donable self-indulgence. She had a new light 


26 


SECOND BEST 


dress this summer, — a silver-gray satteen ; it is 
worth speaking of, because she had hoped for it 
three summers before it “came.” 

She did not wish for many things. She hoped 
for everything she wanted. The perplexity in 
her mind, as she stood still, with her eyes across 
the room, out the window, down toward the shore, 
was if she might know, without having to learn 
by making a mistake, if there were anything she 
could do to earn money, — any new thing. The 
old ways had failed this summer. God knew, and 
how would He tell her ? 

Suppose she were in a city searching for some- 
body she wished to find, knowing the name and 
occupation but not street and number, what would 
she do? Walk aimlessly and curiously about, and 
pray that street and number might flash upon her 
in some supernatural fashion, when there was the 
Directory? The Directory is God’s way of direct- 
ing. She had answered her own question ; she 
usually did answer her own questions : there was 
never any one to ask. 

Now where was the Directory? 

An illumination like the pillar of fire would be 
mysteriously delightful ; but that was their Di- 
rectory. 


ON THE JUMP. 


27 


She had her energy and common sense and 
homely knowledge ; and she had them to use, and 
she would, in faith. I do not know that it is so 
rare an experience that I am setting Rachel apart 
from other Christian girls, when I tell you that 
everything she did she did in faith. Faith took a 
physical hold of her: she felt it in her fingers, 
she knew she lived by it. Leila Provost had faith 
sometimes, and sometimes she did not have it. 
Rachel was so used to doing something or doing 
nothing in faith, that she seldom thought about 
the faith. She asked for it every day, as she 
asked for her daily bread, and believed she had 
had both, with the forgiveness of sins, ever since 
she asked for them : each was common and blessed 
and the gift of God. 

Leila thought she did the best she knew. Ra- 
chel knew the best. 

‘‘ Grandmother,” Rachel exclaimed, “ I know ! 
We will take a boarder.” 

Grandmother was not eighty-two ; but she was 
dying with old age. She was dying daily, sitting 
in her chair at one of the windows that looked 
out upon the shore and over the bay; but she 
was alive enough to be irritable and irritating. 


28 


SECOND BEST. 


Sometimes she was very sweet : then Rachel loved 
her. 

“ A boarder ! ” repeated her grandmother. 
“ You will have to get him before you can take 
him. The boarders are all gone.” 

‘‘ I know it is late in the season ” — 

“You don’t know how to keep a boarder,” the 
scornful old voice went on. “You have to be a 
good cook to keep boarders. Boarders are the 
particularest class of folks in the world! They 
want fresh meat, and nice things for dessert. W e 
live on ham and pork and beans and potatoes and 
brown bread and johnny-cake.” 

“We have eggs and milk and chickens,” re- 
plied the hopeful young voice ; “ and Mint will 
pick berries, and Delia ” — 

“ Mint and Delia I I’d rather have an iron 
spoon and a te^-kettle than both of them to- 
gether I ” 

“ Happily, we have all four. I’ll get the kind 
of boarder that has a relish for plain and whole- 
some fare. We will not suit the boarder; the 
boarder shall suit us. I think I shall keep on the 
watch for a boarder.” 

“You may watch your eyes out,” was the dis- 
couraging rejoinder. 


ON THE JUMP. 


29 


Rachel laughed, — it was easier to laugh than to 
reply, — and began to sprinkle and fold the first 
white article her hand touched on the top of the 
piled clothes’ basket. * 

The early supper was over, and the evening’s 
work consisted of a variety of small doings, — 
sprinkling and folding the clothes for to-morrow’s 
ironing, setting the sponge for bread, mending her 
father’s coat-sleeve, darning the yawning gap in 
the knee of Mint’s pants, fixing the nightly por- 
tion of grandmother’s soda, brushing her hair, 
undressing her, and coaxingly cuddling her in 
among her two small pillows ; and then, after 
reading awhile to her father, her own evening 
would begin, unless she had forgotten something, 
or some one suggested something. Her own even- 
ing to-night was to be given to trying a new kind 
of fancy knitting, something that might be sold in 
a fancy store in Portland. If she might only sell 
enough to buy blankets for her grandmother’s bed 
this winter ! Grandmother grew colder every 
winter, and every winter the blankets grew thin- 
ner. 

Delia had washed the supper dishes, and then 
gone across the street to stay all night with Maude 


30 


SECOND BEST. 


Grey, because her father and mother were with 
friends in Portland, and Maude did not like to 
stay alone all night with nobody but Luke in the 
house. 

“ Grandmother, you forget my garden,” Rachel 
burst out afresh, after humming ‘‘He leadeth me” 
for a few busy moments. “ My corn is sweet and 
juicy, or it will be when it is more ripe. And I 
have cucumbers, and string beans, and squash. 
Captain Grey says my garden is more thriving 
than his.” 

“ It ought to be : yours is smaller and richer.” 

“ A boarder will keep Delia from going back to 
the shoe factory. Poor father rebels against hav- 
ing his daughter work among rough people. All 
she cares to earn money for is to dress herself 
prettily, and she does look pretty, and people tell 
her so and spoil her.” 

“People never tell you so and spoil you,” 
chuckled the grandmother. 

“Nobody was ever untruthful enough,” said 
Rachel, with a laugh, as she rolled a towel into 
smooth, hard dampness. 

It was pleasant work to iron after her folding. 
Delia told her the Avork was half done. Delia’s 


ON THE JUMP, 


31 


work was not always half done, even when she 
considered it wholly done. She was such a pretty 
piece of work herself that anything beyond herself 
had little attraction for her. 

Rachel and her grandmother were in the 
kitchen. Grandmother loved the kitchen because 
of the stir of the work. That morning Rachel 
had churned there, that she might be amused with 
the sound and motion of the dasher. 

“ All I can do is look on, and it’s a pity if I 
can’t have things to look at,” she bemoaned, when 
Delia insisted that the back door-stone was a cool 
place to churn. 

‘‘Never mind! ” Rachel said cheerily, and rolled 
the churn in, and dipped the buttermilk into it 
where the old lady could see and hear and smell it. 

“You are the greatest!” commented Delia. 

Rachel liked to be the greatest — in serving. 

As her quick, light touch sprinkled and folded 
the things that grandmother declared she liked 
to “smell,” Rachel’s thoughts ran on in many 
words she did not speak. The summer twilight 
was deepening into the soft summer darkness. 
Across the road, down the green shore to the 
waters of the bay, she glanced often ; and when 


32 


SECOND BEST. 


the lights of Portland gleamed strong and steady, 
she told grandmother, as she told her every night. 

“There wasn’t gas there when I was a girl,” 
said grandmother to-night. 

“ There was when I was a girl,” said Rachel. 

“It’s ten years to-day since we left Portland, 
and nine years since mother died. She Avas home- 
sick, and it broke her heart to have father change 
so.” 

“ She was a good Avoman,” remarked grand- 
mother. “I Avish you and Delia were like her. 
She was never ugly to me. And Delia never runs 
quick Avhen I ask for things. Hoav long has your 
father been blind ? ” 

“Don’t you remember? It was in the winter 
before Ave came here. He was glad to come and 
hide aAvay from the Avorld.” 

That last day in school, the girl on the slate, 
and the old riA^ers, and the compass plant, — hoAV 
long ago ! 

Through the doorAvay she watched the lank, 
stooping figure of her father, pacing up and down 
the long grass stretch before the house. The tAvi- 
light had not deepened into darkness for him. 
Day and night alike he lived in darkness. Like 


ON THE JUMP. 


33 


grandmother, he liked to be told when Portland 
lights were burning. 

Mint and Luke Grey were playing horse in the 
road. The galloping bare legs occasionally crossed 
her vision with a reminder of the hole in the knee 
that she must mend after the boy went to bed. 

“It’s getting dark,” complained the querulous 
voice, “ I can’t see by the Portland lights if you 
can? 

“ I can’t — quite, grandmother. I am feeling 
my way along.” 

“You are very mean about candles ! Seems to 
me you are mean about most things. Hasn’t your 
father got money in the bank ? ” 

“ But we have only the interest ! And it is so 
little, so very little ! ” 

“ I know about interest,” returned the old 
woman, confidently. “People who live on their 
interest are rich.” 

Weary of repeating her old argument, that the 
richness depended upon how much “ interest ” 
you had, Bachel said nothing. When she could 
not laugh, she had the grace of silence. 

“ Will you get a candle?” was the next de- 
mand. 


34 


SECOND BEST, 


“Not yet. I can work in the dark a few min- 
utes longer. If I were only a fire-fly, and carried 
my light around me, you could see me with the 
light shining about me as I stand here or run 
about. Wouldn’t that be fun? Look out the 
window. The stars are being lighted up in the 
sky.” 

“ I don’t want to,” grumbled grandmother. “ I 
want to look inside. It hurts the back of my 
neck to look up. What will you do when your 
boarder wants a candle ? ” 

“ I’ll tell him a lamp is cheaper. I’ll put candles 
in as an extra. I’ll write all the rules of the house 
and paste them inside his chamber door. He shall 
learn them, and recite them at the breakfast table 
every morning.” 

Grandmother laughed, as interested as a child 
in a fairy story. There was something about 
Rachel as unreal and delightful to her grand- 
mother as a fairy story is to a child. She did not 
know that it was the girl’s faith in the goodness 
and wisdom of Him who makes our lives happier, 
and more surprising than a fairy story. 

“Rule First: Nobody shall disturb my Granny. 

“Rule Second: Nobody shall tell Delia she is 
pretty. 


ON THE JUMP. 


35 


“ Rule Third : Nobody shall ask for something 
that is not on the table. 

‘‘Rule Fourth: Nobody shall speak of anything 
that shall hurt my father. 

“Rule Fifth: Nobody shall encourage Mint to 
be saucy.” 

“ Now make a rule about you,” said the grand- 
mother. 

“ Rule Sixth,” exclaimed Rachel, with a flash of 
fun, “ the New Boarder shall give the Housekeeper 
the Very Thing she wishes most.” 

The sunken eyes shone spiteful in the twilight. 

“ I don’t see what you want, Rachel ; you have 
everything to say about everything in the house 
and all the money to spend. Your father can’t 
see money. Nobody knows how you cheat him.” 

The reproach was nothing new ; but Rachel’s 
heart pushed a sob up into her throat : the laugh 
that tried to come was choked. 

Giving the roll of dampened towels a final pat, 
she said, in her usual tone : — 

“Rule Seventh: Nobody must ask for a towel 
oftener than once a week. Toilet soap cannot be 
had, and sheets, — what can I spin sheets out of? 
Ours are as thin as a spider’s web now.” 


36 


SECOND BEST. 


The dolefulness of the tone sounded droll to 
the old listener. She answered, in strong displeas- 
ure : “ I told you so ! You can’t take a boarder ! ” 
And I told you I could. There’s the big spare 
chamber, and the entry bedroom ! I can take 
two. Summer boarders sleep and eat in the house ; 
all the rest of the day and night they spend on the 
rocks and the water. The rocks and water belong 
to me, — the earth hath He given to the children 
of men, — and I can make something out of His 
rocks and water and woods and fields as well as 
any other of the children of men. I’ll find some- 
body who loves rocks.” 

The slow, dragging step that had been pacing 
the stretch of grass plat halted at the open door. 

‘‘Nathan, come in and make her behave,” 
pleaded Nathan’s old mother. “She says she’s 
going to have her own way. She keeps me in 
the dark, and she’s got candles in the house.” 

“ God keeps me in the dark,” was the bitter 
retort, “ and He’s got the sun in the heavens.” 

Rachel stepped forward and guided him to his 
arm-chair, at the other open window : then she 
lifted his straw hat, and passed her fingers over 
his thin hair. He was not sixty years old, but a 


ON THE JUMP. 


37 


stranger would have believed him to be seventy-' 
five. His face was a hard face. There was no 
submission in his lips. It was hardly strange that 
Mint’ did not love to look at his father. 

“ Father, I have something nice for you. The 
air is almost chilly, and this will warm you through. 
Buttermilk gruel — hot and delicious! It’s for 
you and grandmother, to remind you of your boy- 
hood in the country, when you had it for supper.” 

“ You didn’t tell me about the hot stuff,” grum- 
bled the grandmother, jealously. 

“ Oh, that is one of life’s sweet surprises,” said 
Rachel, with her hopeful laugh. 

Life had not held many sweet surprises to old 
Rachel Ennis. Life was a hard fact to her : it 
had been a hard fact eighty years. Even in the 
freshness of girlhood she had never had ideals to 
reach out to. No enthusiasm or insight had ever 
revealed to her the better thing than the real, — the 
spiritual that was hinted in the things she could 
see and touch. She had taken life in its rough- 
ness and sting. No marvel that it was hard to 
live with her. It was hard for her to live with 
herself. 

Never hoping for anything better, she had never 


38 


SECOND BEST. 


had anything better. Are there not some old 
hearts in whom the Lord has never taken pleasure 
for the reason that they have hoped in his mercy ? 

Her only child, Rachel’s father, had inherited 
his mother’s temperament. When his eyes had 
beheld the sun in the heavens, it had not shone 
bright to him. 

He did not understand his elder daughter : he 
was half afraid of her. Delia was half afraid of 
her, too, while she called her queer and old-fash- 
ioned, and told her she would never be married in 
all the world. Delia was seventeen : she had been 
engaged three months. 

To the youngest in the household, twelve-year- 
old John Milton, abbreviated to Mint, Rachel was 
blessing wuth nothing to mar it. Ray, he called 
her, thinking to himself that he meant not Ray 
for Rachel, but something bright. 

“Father,” the girl began, going back to the 
table where she had been at work, and sprinkling 
a small shower over the coarse table-cloth, “ I have 
something to tell you and ask you.” 

“ Which first ? ” he asked. “ You usually decide 
before you say a word to me.” 

This reproach, also, was nothing new ; indeed, 


ON THE JUMP, 


39 


fault-finding was the oldest thing in her life. She 
knew she had a way of rushing ahead. 

But somebody had to rush ! 

Had she been an Ephesian maiden, two cen- 
turies ago, her deity would have been, not the 
goddess Diana, but the goddess Necessity. 

“ She hasn’t done it yet,” chimed in the voice 
that was always chiming in. # 

‘‘Father, you know we need a little more 
money,” Rachel began, cautiously. It was so 
hard to speak of more money to the blind man, 
who had not earned a dollar for years ; but “ more 
money” moved him when he withstood every 
other argument. 

“That’s the cry from one year’s end to an- 
other,” he answered, sharply. “ What on earth 
do you do with it all? You don’t spend it on 
your father’s comfort.” 

“Nor on mine,” was the spiteful interjection. 

Bracing herself not only mentally but physi- 
cally, Rachel replied: “We will not go over 
housekeeping accounts just now; but I do need 
it. There’s a bill to pay, and comforts to be 
had ; and it came to me that I could take care of 
a boarder or two, and not let you be troubled. 


40 


SECOND BEST. 


eitlier. You and Granny can have a separate 
table — 

“ Yes : a second table,” her father assented, in 
a shrill, angry tone. 

“ No : you shall eat first,” said Rachel, patiently, 
‘‘ or at the same time, and Mint shall wait on you. 
At Ostermoor’s they always have more applica- 
tions for summer board than they can take. I 
will go over to-morrow, if you do not object, and 
see if Mrs. Ostermoor can give me one or two. 
Mrs. Davis — you know her house, father, just 
opposite the Ostermoors — has a family from 
Montreal. Delia told me to-day she met them 
driving ” — 

“ We don’t want Montrealers,” objected the 
grandmother. 

“ I would like a lady, with a little girl,” Rachel 
continued, in her unheeding voice. “Father, you 
wouldn’t mind them. They wouldn’t annoy you.” 

“ Strangers always annoy me : they make a 
mock of my misery.” 

“ If Delia will iron in the morning, I will take 
Mint and go and explore.” 

“ Say she shan’t bring a child into the house, 
Nathan. Mint and Luke Grey set me crazy 
now.” 


ON THE JUMP, 


41 


“She will do what she likes,” returned Rachel’s 
fathei‘, harshly. 

“No, father, I will not go if you will not say 
you are willing,” said Rachel, positively. “ Delia 
can keep house awhile, and I will go away and 
find something to do. If Mrs. Ostermoor needs 
help, I will go into her kitchen. I am willing to 
be poor, but I will not be dishonest. I will earn 
that twenty-five dollars to pay the grocer’s bill, if 
I have to earn it on my hands and knees.” 

“What did you let it get so big for?” de- 
manded the taunting voice of the old woman. 
“ Nathan, she’s awful extravagant.” 

How could Rachel say, “ It was when you were 
so sick, grandmother ” ? 

“ No, no, mother,” her father’s voice broke in, 
“ Rachel tries hard.” 

“Yes, 3'es, so she does!” assented the old 
woman, pacified for the moment. 

“ I do not ask much of life,” said Nathan Ennis, 
in the tone of one defrauded. “ A few thousand 
would put me beyond care.” 

“ Or a little faith,” thought Rachel, smiling in 
the dark. 

She felt a great deal of tenderness toward her 


42 


SECOND BEST. 


father: but, then, her heart was tender toward 
everything that breathed. It was one of her 
aspirations to love somebody she was proud of; 
she had loved her mother ; but she had been 
proud of nothing but her beauty. Delia’s beauty 
was her inheritance from her mother. 

Father, are you willing?” Rachel asked, with 
a tremor in her brave voice. 

“I am not unwilling,” was the slow, cautious 
reply. 

With this ungracious consent she was forced to 
be satisfied : but, then, was not his only praise the 
forbearing to find fault? His eyes were turned 
inward, and he saw nothing save himself. 

Get a young lady, then,” suggested Mrs. 
Ennis, entering into what she foresaw was the 
inevitable, “a nice, pleasant-spoken young lady, 
who won’t complain of what she has to eat, and 
won’t have much in the wash.” 

“ That last isn’t to be thought of, grandmother. 
The ‘ wash ’ is a large part of a young lady’s ward- 
robe in summer. But I’ll do the washing and 
charge by the dozen, and that will be clear gain. 
O, father, don’t you remember that Miss Ryder 
that was at the Greys one summer? She made 


ON THE JUMP, 


43 


no more trouble than a robin redbreast. She came 
over to read to you, and she was lovely to grand- 
mother. The Greys haven’t heard from her for 
a long time. Anna Ryder, — I wish I could go 
fishing over at Ostermoors and catch lierT 

“You may have her if you can find her,” her 
father replied, with an increase of interest. “I 
have a lot of medical journals rotting while there’s 
no one to read to me.” 

Rachel read aloud to him every spare moment; 
but he never made account of it when alluding to 
that pile of medical journals. Delia read rapidly 
and indistinctly and made him nervous : he would 
rise and walk away after twenty minutes’ endur- 
ance. 

“ Gan’t you get her?” inquired Mrs. Ennis. 
“She told me lots of things about folks.” 

“ Her home had been New York City,” said 
Rachel, “ but she came here from somewhere else. 
She had been with her grandmother, and she came 
here because her grandmother died, and she had 
no other home. She was very white and still 
when she came, but as merry as a mouse before 
the summer was ended. I think,” said Rachel, 
pondering, as if the thought had just come to her, 


44 


SECOND BEST, 


‘‘ that she was one of the kind of people that is 
ready for the second best.” 

“Who ever gets the best?” grumbled her 
father. “ You don’t, with all your cheerfulness.” 

“Perhaps the cheerfulness is the best,” said 
Rachel ; “ but how can one tell, until one is all 
through, what the best is f ” 

“You can tell what it isn’t,” was his quick 
evasion. “ You have youth and presumption 
enough to hope for anything.” 

“ Even for a good time coming for you, father 
dear.” 

“Is the gruel keeping TiotV'^ interrupted the 
grandmother, anxiously. 

“ Piping hot,” laughed Rachel. “ I made a chip 
fire to keep it hot. And, father, don’t discourage 
me. It says in a book I read, ‘Wherefore dis- 
courage ye the children of Israel from going over 
into the land the Lord hath given them ? ’ ” 

“ That’s about all the book you do read. I 
wish my daughter had literary taste.” 

“ That book is literature itself : it was Europe’s 
literature for a thousand years.” 

“ There’s nothing about medicine in it.” 

“ Oh, I forgot to tell you ! I can show you 


ON THE JUMP, 


45 


medicine in it. It knew the life was in the blood 
before learned men knew about the blood. I 
thought of that while I was reading to you about 
the blood this morning. I wish I could find 
- somebody to study medicine with you. You are 
such a good teacher, and your memory is perfect. 
Oh, how I wi%li it ! ” 

Rachel, you are crazy to-night,” said her 
father, with pity in his voice that was not all for 
himself. 

“ Then I love to be crazy with hope ! ” 

“ Who would study with a blind man ? ” 

‘‘ I wish I could. The first lady physician, 
ages ago, was the daughter of a doctor, and 
studied with her father, and practised in male 
attire, — I wish I could remember where, but I 
suppose it was Rome or Athens, — and then, she 
was discovered ” — 

“ And burnt at the stake ?” he interrupted. 

‘‘No: she was. allowed to attend women and 
children.” 

“ Rache, I don’t believe it’s hot now''' 

Rachel hurried out to the shed, where she kept 
the kitchen stove in summer, and returned with 
a tallow candle in a small iron candlestick; then 


46 


SECOND BEST. 


she hurried out again, and brought two yellow 
bowls of steaming buttermilk gruel. 

‘‘ Rachel, I don’t want a man about the house,” 
her father insisted, as she tucked a coarse white 
towel under his chin, and placed the bowl in his 
hands. “ He would spy me, and pity me, and 
wonder where I kept my money, and argue with 
me, and know more than I do.” 

Don’t be anxious,” Rachel comforted. I’ll 
find a dove in a gray dress, and she will coo and 
coo and not peck at any of us.” 

“ Where’s mine ? ” demanded the grandmother, 
displeased at the delay. 

“ Where’s mine ? ” It was the question the old 
woman had been demanding of the world all her 
life. 

She had not asked it of God. She did not 
know how to ask things of God. 

“ Here is yours, hot and nice.” 

The bowl was placed in her hand, and the 
towel tucked under her chin. 

It doesn’t taste as it used to : it’s too thick,” 
complained Nathan Ennis. 

“ It’s too salt,” complained his mother. 

I’ll fix that,” said Rachel, patiently. ‘‘ I’ll 


ON THE JUMP, 


47 


pour hot buttermilk in, if you will wait two min- 
utes.” 

‘‘ I’ve waited long enough,” muttered the grand- 
mother. ‘‘You don’t give me farina and straw- 
berry jam as you did when I was sick.” 

The one tallow candle lighted the room but 
dimly; but Mrs. Ennis could see the bowl and 
spoon, and, refreshed by the taste and odor, gave 
all her mind to the enjoyment of the gruel. 

And then Rachel had a few moments to herself. 
Without a word, she slipped out into the shed 
and through the open door, across a field, to a 
lawn adjoining. The handsome house was not 
lighted. The occupants were travelling, and 
Rachel had her little sanctuary to herself, without 
fear of curious eyes. 

The sanctuary was only a door-stone, — large, 
flat, surrounded with a low hedge of cedar. It 
stood in the rear of the house, with not a tree 
about it : it was the step of the east door of the 
first church that had been built in that part of the 
country. The new church stood a mile down the 
road. 

It was a quiet place to kneel and pray. Mint 
could not run after her, Delia could not find her, 


48 


SECOND BEST, 


her father and grandmother would never think 
she was there. 

The spot had been dedicated to God’s service. 
He owned it, He had blessed it, and she so rarely 
could go to church. Her father refused to go 
Avith her, and there was no one beside herself to 
read the Bible to him Sunday mornings. On 
Sundays he never objected to Bible reading: it 
was a part of the day. 

She could not be long spared. In fifteen min- 
utes, before each bowl was scraped clean with the 
Avorn silver spoon, she was in the kitchen, sifting 
flour for her bread. 

“ I suppose the Lord can’t trust us Avith money,” 
her father remarked, in bitterness of spirit, rising 
to set his bowl on the table. 

Rachel did not speak her quick thought, “ He 
has trusted me with something He likes better, — 
work.” The thought she did speak was, ‘‘ But He 
trusts us with so many good things, father.” 

Perhaps with not as many as you think you 
have,” was the softened rejoinder. ‘‘ I think I 
will say good night, mother. The days are long 
to me. When I am asleep, I can see as well as 
other people.” 


ON THE JUMP, 


49 


‘‘ Good night, Nathan ; but I think you might 
stay and talk to me. You don’t seem to think 
the days are long to me^ 

Go to bed, then,” he answered, rudely. 

Good night, father,” said Rachel, cheerily, 
goiog to him, and laying on his arm her fingers, 
dusted with flour, guiding him to the stairway. 

Oh, dear ! oh, dear ! oh, deary me ! ” groaned 
the voice from the rocker at the window. An- 
other day has come and gone, and what’s the 
good of it ? ” 

‘‘ Think of all the little children born to-day,” 
said Rachel, stepping back to her work, ‘‘ and all 
the mothers that are so glad ! And so many peo- 
ple are married, and I know that is good for ever 
so many of them.” 

‘‘And all the poor and hungry people, — but I 
think you like to be poor.” 

She thought she did : it was another reason for 
the Lord to care about her. She believed to-night 
that nothing helped her like those two words, — 
without money. 

Her father would have laughed in derision had 
she told him of this bit of comfort. He thought 
often that her simplicity bordered on simpleness. 


60 


SECOND BEST. 


The undercurrent of intense spirituality was 
stayed sometimes by the light and bright talk that 
something in her threw up to the surface : its very 
lightness had its own weight, and its brightness 
was something that lasted. 

“And people have started off travelling,” she 
ran on ; “ and some people have spent dollars and 
dollars in pretty things. Granny, let us be glad 
of all the good times in the world ! — and glad 
because you have had a hot supper, and will soon 
be cuddled up in bed, and have somebody to take 
care of you, and to-morrow I’ll come home and 
tell you stories about the people at Ostermoor 
Point. And when we have boarders you shall 
have farina every day, and I’ll afford sugar to 
make jam for you this winter. If you won’t be 
cross and grumble before the boarders, and not 
contradict poor father. I’ll make something nice 
for you every day. Will you promise?” de- 
manded Rachel, with decision. 

“ If I am cross, won’t you make me things ? ” 
pleaded the pitiful old voice. 

Second childhood, in its physical weakness, with 
the unchecked faults that have grown with years, 
is very touching in its hopelessness, — there is so 
little time left to outgrow. 


ON THE JUMP. 


51 


Rachel was tempted to say, ‘‘Yes, I will, just 
the same ” ; but experience came to the rescue, 
and she answered firmly, “No, grandmother; you 
shall have farina at night only when you haven’t 
been cross.” 

“ I’ll try,” sighed the old woman ; then she 
added, with a natural spitefulness that had grown 
stronger with the contradictions in her life, “ I 
hope you’ll never be old and have somebody ugly 
to you.” 

The only thing that rested Rachel through and 
through was having faith. The few kneeling mo- 
ments on the stone had given her a wonderful 
uplift. She was not afraid of being old, or of 
anything else. To-morrow would be like a day 
in a story-book, — like a day in God’s story-book 
of her life. 

As His willing servant she had definite purpose, 
a strong will, endless persistence. 

“ You will have to work like a dog with your 
boarders,” said the grandmother, irritated by the 
promise she had been forced to make. 

“Well, life is not altogether a labor-saving in- 
stitution,” replied Rachel, in the dryest of her dry 
tones. 


52 


SECOND BEST. 


“I wish I could work; but I’m nobody and 
nothing now,” cried the old voice, bitterly. 

It was no wonder that Rachel shivered for an 
instant with the thought of some day being old — 
like her. It was sad to live long enough to see ^ 
your place filled, your Avork done, by some one, 
not better qu3,lified, only younger. 

One of the strong influences that had pushed 
Rachel was the determination, made years ago, 
not to grow like her father and grandmother. She 
liad studied them to learn what her inheritances 
might be, — not with any disrespect, but a loving 
pity. Like Daniel, the sins of her forefathers 
Avere pressing upon her. Sometimes, she con- 
fessed them as if they were her OAvn. 

With such associations, and bearing alone the 
household burden, the only thing that had kept 
her young Avas a variety of interests. She lived 
in Mint’s life ; she lived in Delia’s life. Every- 
thing about her Avas alwe and growing. 

You forget things so,” Delia had charged her 
with, when she said she had forgotten hoAv hard 
the Avatchful nights Avith her grandmother were. 
They were hard, perhaps ; but something about 
them had been so SAveet that she had forgotten the 


ON THE JUMP. 


53 


hardness. She had had time to read, sitting at the 
bedside ; and time to read was treasure. 

To her, even on busiest days, there was a wide 
difference between household care and household 
drudgery. She was a care-taker because she had 
to be ; but she was never a drudge, and never had 
the air of one. Her boarders would be like the 
sails of a ship, bearing her into a desired haven. 

She did not have to reason about many things, 
because she believed. Her brain did not get en- 
tangled . in her heart and hinder with questioning. 
All the brain she had had heart in it. Perhaps 
she was not as “bright” as Leila Provost: she 
had been shut out from man’s wisdom, and shut 
up to God’s wisdom. 

“ I want to go to bed,” whimpered the grand- 
mother. Rachel kissed her after she was in bed : 
her grandmother would have called her back had 
she forgotten. 

Then she went downstairs to her evening’s sew- 
ing. Her smooth forehead wrinkled itself over 
the work, but the work kept smooth and even. 
The letter Delia had proudly and timidly read 
to her that afternoon, written on shipboard and 
mailed at Liverpool, was disturbing, — not to Delia, 


54 


SECOND BEST 


for the child was flattered and joyous over it. 
Why shouldn’t he tell her how pretty she was, 
with her yellow hair and brown eyes, and promise 
to take her all over the world when he had his 
ship, and say lie wished she were in the city where 
she would not be such a little country girl, and all 
she needed to make her admired was city ways 
and manners and becoming dress? She must not 
get ideas, and think his life among men was 
wrong because he was not stiff and strait-laced, 
and did not have the Bible at his tongue’s end. 
He had outgrown his father’s ideas. He was in 
the world : his father was stranded on the rocks. 
Dear old man ! He regretted to trouble him, and 
he would come home, and cheer him up, and show 
him he had not got so far out of the way as he 
believed. And Delia must go to the village often, 
and see his father and mother; and, when his 
sister suggested anything, he hoped she would do 
it. His sister was not old-fashioned and queer: 
she knew what a young girl’s life ought to be. 

“ And I Rachel exclaimed aloud, jerking 

at her thread. ‘‘ O Charlie Harris, I wish Delia 
were not so pretty and taking. I wish she ” — 

But wasn’t the world full of ‘‘ pretty and tak- 


ON THE JUMP, 


55 


ing ” girls ? Didn’t she love to be on the watch 
for them every time she found herself on the train, 
especially in summer, when people from every- 
where went to the White Mountains ? It wasn’t 
that : it was, — what was it ? Had she failed in 
being a good sister to loving, flighty, easily flat- 
tered Delia? 

And was she ‘‘queer,” and didn’t she know 
what a young girl’s life should be ? W ould she 
have Delia like herself, “tied down,” as Mrs. Grey 
put it, to her family? But who had tied her 
down ? Didn’t God know what a young girl’s 
life should be ? 

Her “young girl” life was ended: she was a 
woman of twenty-five. She had tried to find out 
what God wanted her to do and to do it ; and the 
ending was with Him, in His Book of Life, where 
she hoped her name was written. Anxiety was 
not faith. Was she “anxious” about Delia ? 

There was a letter on the table, with its super- 
scription, in dainty writing, uppermost, — “Miss 
Rachel Ennis.” How pretty it looked. When 
they were at school together. Lulu Proctor and 
herself, she dressed as handsomely as Lulu, and 
her outlook for a happy womanhood was as bright ; 


56 


SECOND BEST. 


but Lulu’s father had not become blind. He had 
grown richer and richer and richer: he had taken 
her father’s practice. Now Lulu was to be married, 
and had invited her to be her bridesmaid, “for the 
sake of the dear old times.” 

Delia could keep house for two days and let her 
go ; but that was only a part of going. She had 
nothing to wear but the satteen, — no gloves, no 
shoes. She would not even speak to her father 
of the invitation. She could not go and sit among 
the others as a looker-on at a wedding, for he. 
only dress was not a wedding dress : it was fit for 
a call on a neighbor, or an afternoon at home if 
some one should come to tea, and it was all she 
had for a summer dress. She would write to Lulu 
and say she was glad that she was so happy. She 
was ‘Hied down.” An outing to Portland by 
train or boat was all the travelling she ever had ; 
and Lulu was going to Europe on her wedding 
tour. 

Lulu was true and good. When they were 
little girls together. Lulu had written her a tiny 
note, and asked her if she didn’t Avant to be a 
Christian : %}ie Avanted to be, and Avouldn’t it be 
beautiful to begin together ? 


ON- THE JUMP. 


57 


“ I don’t know why, I don’t have to know,” she 
thought, taking rapid stitches. “ She is religious, 
and she has things in the Avoiid, too.” 

Rachel liked the word “ religion ” for its root 
meaning, — to hind fast. She liked to be bound 
fast, even if it meant bound fast as a slave, not 
doing anything but as her Master commanded; to 
be possessed from head to foot with His will. 

His will was one thing for her, and another for 
her schoolmate. He had a right to His will, and 
He had a right to her. 

He had a right to keep her tied down until 
His own hand let her go free : this bondage was 
her perfect liberty. 

“Good night! good night!” shouted Mint, out 
in the road. 

He came in and stood leaning against her chair. 
She smiled, but did not speak. She did not al- 
ways understand him, half foolish and half wise 
as he was ; but she loved him so much that he 
always felt understood. 

“Maude Grey gave me a paper for you,” he 
said, bringing it out of his pocket, and unrolling it, 
— “a little bit of a paper, and I guess I haven’t 
squeezed the good all out of it.” 


58 


SECOND BEST. 


He laid it in her lap, and, looking down upon a 
crumpled leaf, her eyes caught the words, — 

“No hands can bear 
A gift that are so filled with care.” 

Pushing the needle into the work, she took up the 
paper, and found a truth that filled her life with 
joy many a day : — 

“ What care ? the King said, and he smiled 
To hear for answer a wailing wild, 

‘ I only toil to feed a child.’ ” 

“ And then, with such a look divine. 

He whispered : ‘ But the child is mine.* ” 

Good night, Ray,” said Mint, kissing her 
shoulder. * 

Good night, little boy. Do you want to take 
a long Avalk with me to-morrow ? ” 

To Portland?” 

‘‘ Oh, no, indeed ! to Ostermoor Point.” 

‘^Yes, I do.” 

“ Then weTl go. Thank you for the paper. 
It’s better than gold.” 

I haven’t been on that clam dock this sum- 
mer. You never will let me go off with boys. 
Will you stay to dinner? — I like to go there to 
dinner, — and let me go on the clam dock?” 


ON THE JUMP. 


59 


“ Yes : if Delia' will do everything for father 
and grandmother. We will take a day’s vaca- 
tion, and see what will come of it. What do you 
think will come of it ? ” she asked, in the tone of 
inspiration the boy needed. 

“ Nothing : nothing ever comes, Ray. I do get 
awfully discouraged.” 

“ Never mind,” she answered cheerily. ‘‘ Every 
day helps the next day along.” 

But Mint’s next day was always like the day 
before. He was happy because Ray loved him; 
he was jealous of every demand upon her time 
and thought, — of everything in her life that did 
not include himself. Sensitive in the extreme, 
the life of his father and grandmother had shad- 
owed his childhood. If it were not for Ray, he 
said, life would be too much ” for him. Ray 
often told him that he belonged to her as no one 
else did : he was the only one in the world who 
was her “very own.” 

“ I would like to do something as hard as to 
discover a new metal,” he remarked, unfastening 
her hair, and shaking it over her shoulders. 

“ Getting up early in the morning, for instance,” 
she laughed. 


60 


SECOND BEST. 


‘‘ Do you know what gallium is ? ” he asked, 
ignoring her suggestion. 

“'No : I am going to seed. I have to — in sum- 
mer.” 

‘‘ That’s the time for going to seed,” he re- 
marked sagely, twisting her hair and attempting 
to fasten it into a knot. 

‘‘ And also the time for going to bed.” 

“You seem to think it’s the time for not going 
to bed,” he returned, argumentatively. “ What 
are you so glad about to-night ? Your eyes shine.” 

“I’m glad about to-morrow.” 

“ And yesterday ? ” 

“Yes — now it is over.” 

“Ray, darling, I wish I could get things for you.” 

Jesus Christ could. He could get everything 
for her, — everything she wanted. She would 
rather have everything He wanted. 

“You do. Mint.” 

“But not elegant things,” he insisted, 

“ I do not long for anything to-night, but some- 
thing I can have. Now good-night, dear.” 

He went off lingeringly, and Rachel sewed and 
pondered and looked happy. 

Every to-morrow was a happy thing to her : it 


ON THE JUMP, 


61 


was a day God knew about, and would tell her 
when the time came. She was not weary ; she was 
only healthily tired. It was not rest from work, 
but rest in work, that saved her from overwork. 

Her father going up to bed in his blindness and 
desolation was on her heart ; but should she be 
unhappy because she could not give him sight 
and peace? 

Was the Lord unhappy about her father? 

He could give him peace. 

Would He see, was He seeing now, the travail 
of His soul in him and being satisfied? 

And about herself : suppose she had but two 
talents to work with ; the same reward was given 
in the very same words to the man who worked 
with two as to the man who worked with five; 
the three talents more made so little difference, 
made no difference. Why should she care for 
three talents more? Would God be served any 
better? Would her joy now, and then, be any 
greater ? 

She finished her mending, sitting alone at the 
kitchen table. The lights across the street were 
company, and the girls’ voices singing at the melo- 
deon. Then she knit a finger of her wool lace. 
By that time her eyelids were drooping drowsily. 


62 


SECOND BEST. 


She had risen at five. The clock struck ten as 
she rolled up her knitting and put it in the top 
drawer of the high bureau in a corner of the 
kitchen. The lights were out across the street. 
Probably Maude and Delia had talked and laughed 
each other to sleep. Her father’s door stood ajar. 

“ Good night, father,” she said, softly. 

“ Good night, daughter.” 

His tone was quieter. Hoav did she know that 
God did not have ways of His own, and ways 
of her father’s own, to comfort him ? 

Her grandmother was asleep and Mint, — she 
shaded her candle with her hand, and looked at 
both. 

She fell asleep herself before she could decide 
whether the parlor chamber w'ould need new cur- 
tains for the boarder, and if she had quilts enough 
for chilly nights, and if grandmother would ob- 
ject to the old cliina being used for supper, and 
if her father would allow her to bring out the 
silver he had locked up for a day of need. 

And now that you may understand and feel at 
home with the people she found at Ostermoor 
Point, I must begin by telling you about Anna 
Ryder and the night she promised to marry David 
Ostermoor. 


III. 


THE SECRET THAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN TOLD. 

“ He is worth no weal that can bide no woe/* 

^‘All sorts of things and weather 
Must be taken in together, 

To make up a year 
And a sphere.** 

When Anna Ryder begged David Ostermoor 
to keep the knowledge of their sudden engage- 
ment between themselves for one year, she had no 
thought that her happy secret could work any 
evil. She was not wronging any human being, 
she argued, that night she sat alone in her cham- 
ber, and went over again and again the long talk 
of the evening. She had no one to wrong, no 
one had the right to know, until she chose to tell, 
this thing that had happened to her. It had hap- 
pened to her later in life than to any of her girl 
friends, for she was twenty-five, and every one 
of her school friends was married under twenty- 
three. She was old enough to have her own way, 
and old enough to be wise about it. Her father 


64 


SECOND BEST. 


died four years ago. Her step-mother had not 
recognized her, excepting by the frown that had 
taken the heart out of her childhood, that very 
day, as they chanced to sit opposite each other in 
a street-car. It was unbearable, and she had borne 
it but a block. It was the first time they had 
met face to face since the day they stood side by 
side looking down into a dead face. It was this 
chance meeting in the car that moved her that 
evening into tears, while she told the story anew 
of her homeless, motherless childhood. 

‘‘A year before my father died he could not 
bear it any longer. She had not spoken to me 
for seven years, and that summer, while I was in 
the country with my grandmother, he wrote to 
me not to come home again, — that I might stay 
Avith her or come back to New York as I chose. 
He Avould be happy if I Avere happy. But I came 
back that I might be near him, and he used to 
come to see me as often as he could Avhen she did 
not knoAV it. I Avas all he had, — only three years 
old Avhen he married her. She Avas kind to me in 
her Avay, Avhich Avas not a mother’s way, until I 
grew up to look so much like my mother, and my 
father used to tell me so. She turned her two 


THE SECRET. 


65 


little girls against me. They wanted to love me. 
I loved them dearly. One of them is married, — 
she is living with her, — and the other died the 
year father died. I went home to see Rosie in her 
coffin, but I did not speak to her mother. I was 
afraid of intruding ; and that same old frown 
when she saw me was in her face to-day. I know 
I was not good and sweet, — but I love to be for- 
given, and to forgive.” 

She felt again David Ostermoor’s eyes as she 
poured out her story and her tears : they did not 
fill with tears, but they were full of tenderest 
compassion. 

And, then, she argued all over to herself again, 
would he wrong any one by keeping their prom- 
ise to each other a secret for a little while ? He 
had two children. Sophie was a college girl, and 
John, if not a college boy, was a boy, with all his 
twenty-two years, and showed his admiration of 
herself as frankly as a boy of twelve. 

Her home had been opposite the Ostermoors 
every winter since she left her father’s house. 
Sophie began to take music lessons of her that 
first winter, and it was through the child that she 
had met the father. 


66 


SECOND BEST, 


‘‘ Papa, do come and hear Miss Ryder play,” 
Sophie urged, and see if she isn’t as lovely as 
she can be ! And we will play our duet for you.” 

Sophie’s mother died the summer before in 
Dresden, and Sophie and John came home with 
tlieir father, and the three settled down into a 
stillness, in the large, empty house, that made 
Sopliie desolate and John desperate. 

Their father had his business. The second win- 
ter after his wife’s death David Ostermoor passed 
in Europe. John was in his last year in col- 
lege and working hard. iNIiss Ostermoor, Sophie’s 
great aunt, was housekeeper. She loved house- 
keeping, but she did not love children. If a child 
were clothed, warmed, fed, housed, there her care 
ended, and David Ostermoor’s daughter was abun- 
dantly provided for. Miss Ostermoor often asked 
at bed-time if her lessons for the next day were 
learned, and if she had practised as long as Miss 
Ryder wished, and then went to sleep, thankful 
that the child Avas so little care, and that she had 
all her time for iier housekeeping. The little 
thing in the black dress ran across the street every 
day to her music teacher for something better 
than music. Her brother John she loved with 


THE SECRET. 


67 


the passionate devotion of a most passionate heart, 
and then she loved her father, and then Miss 
Ryder. 

“ First, I’ll die for John, and then for papa, and 
then for you, Miss Ryder,” she said, one afternoon, 
as her little black self and yellow head were cud- 
dled in Miss Ryder’s arms. “ You don’t mind 
being last, do you?” she asked, anxiously. 

After them isn’t last,” laughed Anna Ryder. 

Miss Ostermoor told John and wrote to David 
that no harm could possibly come of the child’s 
craze for Miss Ryder. 

And it had come to tld^ : for David told her 
that evening that he began to love her for his 
child’s sake, — for John’s, also, he might have 
said; for this last year John had been at home, 
nnd Miss Ryder was his craze,” also. 

The five years, the summers and winters, Anna 
lived again in her painfully pleasant reverie : she 
went with the Ostermoors somewhere every sum- 
mer. She went with John and Sophie, and their 
father came for the last week or two. A part of 
every year he spent in business abroad, having a 
business interest in Paris and Dresden as well as 
in New York ; but he had never written once to 


68 


SECOND BEST, 


her. The children never associated her in any 
Avay with their father. She was Sophie’s friend 
and John’s. 

David Ostermoor was dignified, silent, and re- 
served even with his children. His daughter 
loved him best when she least understood him. 
His son had grown away from his boyish fondness 
for him. He was proud of his father, but lie did 
not love him. David Ostermoor felt that he had 
left his son away back on the road of his childhood. 
He did not know this young man, he did not know 
v/hat to do with him. Their letters to each other 
filled two pages. Their conversations, except upon 
some matters of business, would have filled one 
page. 

Anna thought she understood them both, be- 
cause she loved them both. She knew David 
Ostermoor loved her as soon as he knew it himself. 
She was not in the least surprised when he told 
her that he had loved her for years, and had been 
Availing* to see if it would be “ Avise ” to ask her 
to become his Avife. She Avas not surprised, but 
she was startled. She was hardly ready to say, 
‘^Yes”; she Avas not at all ready to say, ‘‘No.” 
Early in the evening she had thrown herself doAvn 


THE SECRET. 


69 


upon her bed and fallen asleep. Awaking with an 
uneasy feeling, she lay still, with a sob in her 
heart. She was very lonely. Life was a hard 
fight, and the long look ahead gave her nothing 
new nor sweet. The sob swelled into her throat. 
She sprang up, gathered her loosened hair, and 
was twisting it in both hands when the tap at her 
door announced, ‘‘Mr. Ostermoor, Mr. David Os- 
termoor, is in the parlor.” 

She told him she had been asleep and awoke 
almost crying in her sleep. She was dreaming 
that Sophie was repeating something she said that 
afternoon : “ If I had a step-mother, I should go to 
England to live with my grandmother. If I loved 
anybody, I should hate her if she married my 
father.” 

And then, after he had quieted her with a long, 
silent caress, she pleaded: “Do let us be very 
wise. Do not let me spoil Sophie’s life as my 
home and girlhood were spoiled.” 

''''You could not spoil any one’s life,” he said, 
smiling at her wistful eyes, and stooping to kiss 
her wistful lips. 

“ Let it not be an engagement at all, then,” she 
urged. “ If we understand each other, let it stay 


70 


SECOND BEST. 


as it is ; and if it be right, if they will be happy, 
John and Sophie, at the end of the year I will 
promise to marry you.” 

“ How do you propose to make them happy in 
the mean time ? ” he questioned. 

They will know me better, and love me better. 
They will see that I am not utterly selfish in 
stealing their father.” 

“ My plan would be immediate marriage, — in 
that way prove to them my wisdom in choosing 
you, and your fitness to be chosen.” 

‘‘ Oh, no, no, no ! ” She shivered, and drew her- 
self away from him. “David,” — it was the first 
time she had spoken his name, and she felt how 
it touched him, — “ I love your children more than 
you understand. I will not marry you if they are 
not willing. You are their father, and that means 
as much to me as to be my husband. Perhaps it 
means more. I think it does. I would not give 
them a year of unhappiness for a whole lifetime 
of happiness for myself. Sophie wept in my arms 
for her mother when she was a little thing. I 
think — you know there are such women — that 
I have more motheiiiness in me than wifeli- 


THE SECRET. 


71 


I am not afraid about either. It was your way 
of loving that made me love you, my darling.” 

‘‘ And you promise, then, you do promise, not to 
speak to them for a whole year ? It will come of 
itself and not shock them ; but you must not 
change in your manner, even, toward me. I am 
glad you are going away, so that they cannot sus- 
pect. I must think a while. The whole world 
has changed to me. I do not feel as if I were my- 
self. David, do you promise?” 

“ Dear, I promise you,” said David Ostermoor, 
who always kept his word. 

“ I don’t believe I want to be a step-mother,” she 
laughed, and then burst into tears. 

He gathered her into his arms as he would have 
taken Sophie, and, in her joy and sorrow, she felt 
as if he were her own father, and Sophie’s father, 
and David Ostermoor, the man she had promised 
to marry. This girl, with her blue eyes and her 
quick laugh and her quick tears, had taken a hold 
upon him that surprised his reasoning self. He 
loved his children, but for the time he forgot them. 
He would have married her to-morrow and taken 
her abroad, leaving them behind without one pang ; 
but she would not have gone. He loved her bet- 


72 


SECOND BEST. 


ter than she loved him, and she loved his children 
better than he loved them. 

‘‘Anna, will you some time tell me you love 
me ? ” he asked. 

“Yes — some time,” she answered, lightly. 

Long after midnight she fell asleep. She had 
been wise, she knew. In two days he sailed, and 
John and Sophie never guessed. 

And thus was the evil wrought. 

Five months afterward, John Ostermoor told 
her he loved her, and asked her, in his simple, 
straightforward, boyish manner, to marry him, 
when he was old enough, and good enough, and 
rich enough. 

“ You have made a man of me, Anna Ryder. 
I know my father will be willing. He said the 
day he went away that he would rather Sophie 
would be like you than like any woman in the 
world.” 

And then Anna Ryder thought her heart would 
break. 

“You are nothing but a girl like Sophie when 
you let down your hair, and I am a big, tall, 
clumsy fellow, and look old enough to be your 
husband,” he ended, with a proud, shy laugh. 


THE SECRET. 


73 


Nothing but a girl she felt that night when she 
thought her heart would break : “ O John, John ! 
Don't ! I have promised to many your father.” 

What John said or did she would never know. 
The first she knew, she was alone in her chamber. 
Something more terrible than anything she could 
fear had come upon her. She had made John hate 
his father. She must flee from them both : they 
would both hate her. 

And Sophie would never forgive her, — Sophie, 
who would die for John, and loved her least of all. 

She might have known it. She was a woman, 
and a woman’s sure instinct should have warned 
her. She had not said or done one thing to pre- 
pare them, or make anything easier. That day 
she had taken her mail from the postman, so that 
Sophie might not see the foreign letter he held in 
his hand for her. She had deceived her, she had 
deceived J ohn ; but she had meant to be so true, 
so wise, so unselfish. 

Must she rush over to them and tell them all 
the story? Could she look John in the face and 
tell him she must marry his father? Could she 
hide her face on David Ostermoor’s shoulder and 
tell him that his son wished her to become his 


74 


SECOND BEST. 


wife? And she was not old yet, and must bear 
this trouble all her life. 

Emma Soule called that afternoon, as radiant 
as though she had never wept her heart out ; and 
she had been engaged to Frank Soule, and when 
he died had married his brother, — a year after- 
ward ! Girls did not die, or bury themselves in 
a dark corner of the earth. Something helped 
them through. But who would help John — and 
his father ? She had been so busy in loving that 
she had forgotten about being loved. 

He was David’s boy,” — his father often spoke 
of him as “ the boy.” In his letter that afternoon 
he said, “ I hope to find my boy more of a man.” 
She had loved him so whole-heartedly and shown 
it as frankly and openly as she had shown her love 
for his sister. Had not Sophie said, half-jealously, 
I believe you love John better than you do me ” ? 

He was nearly four years younger, and thinking 
of herself as his father’s wife had made her feel 
old. She was trying not to be so girlish, — 
“frisky,” John called it, when she tramped with 
him and Sophie in a country walk, and played tag 
through parlors and halls after dinner when the 
gas was lighted. 


THE SECRET. 


75 


How could John think of her as his grave 
father’s wife ! He was twenty years older, and 
John was four years younger. He was twenty 
years .older, and old and silent and grave for his 
years, and she was twenty years younger, and 
young in face and manner and feeling, even for 
her years. 

“You are not twenty-two,” a gentleman pro- 
tested two days ago. But she could not help that, 
or anything now. Forty-five and twenty-five they 
were, and years could not be changed, and she 
loved him, if she would not tell him so that night. 
That night she was not sure about anything but 
that he loved her, and that she rejoiced in his love 
and rested in it. 

She had youth enough for both. He seemed 
very old to-night, when she thought of herself 
and John, old enough to have had all his life; 
and John had his yet to live. 

He would say her foolishness had wrought it 
all. He would say she had led John on and made 
him love her. Sophie had told her that his tem- 
per was as quick and high as John’s, and that 
he had the same jealous spirit. When they were 
angry with each other, she could not tell whose 


76 


SECOND BEST. 


eyes shot the hottest fire. She was afraid of him : 
she was afraid to tell him. 

She was not afraid of John. The boy would 
kneel at her side and put his head in her la,p and 
cry : it would not be the first time . 

She would write to David Ostermoor, and then 
go away where she would never see the face of 
one of them again. They would never seek her 
out : they would all be glad to forget the girl who 
had come between them. Then she sat down and 
wrote her letter to John’s father : it was to John’s 
father all the way through. At the end was a 
word to David Ostermoor, the man she had prom- 
ised to marry. As the words ran over the paper, 
she wondered it did not scorch and shrivel, so hot 
were they, — drops of fire from a burning heart. 
The boy had been deceived : she had deceived 
him. Would he not extend their engagement to 
another year, that John might not be further 
wronged ? If she might only die to-night ! But 
God did not want her in heaven yet : she won- 
dered that He wanted her on earth. 

In his business office in Dresden, David Oster- 
moor read the letter. He singled it out from 
among many others, snatching it with the haste 


THE SECRET 


77 


of a lover ; and then his thin lips were pressed 
tight together, and his eyes shot fire. 

She loved John ; she had no pity for him. No 
woman promised in marriage could allow friendli- 
ness to run into the familiarity that brings a con- 
fession of love. Sophie had written what good 
friends ” the two were, how John spent all his 
evenings across the street ; and had not her letters 
lately been full of John? — John’s new love of 
study, John’s temperament, John’s future, and his 
growing manliness ; and now it was John’s chosen 
wife. 

They were none of his, the two who had de- 
ceived him, plotting against him. The unusual 
frankness and length of John’s letters had been 
because %lie wished it. She had stolen his son, and 
John had stolen his wife. With a dash of the pen 
he would fling them both aside, and Sophie, who 
was true, should come to him. 

Anna Ryder read his letter, and her heart did 
not break, she did not shed one tear, or utter one 
cry: it was a way out. 

And John? Between them would they send 
him to destruction ? With Sophie away, his father 
estranged, and herself taken from him, where 


78 


SECOND BEST, 


would the boy turn ? The boy turned the day his 
father’s letter came: he went West. She had no 
hold on him, she could not write to him. Would 
praying do any good ? 

Sophie and her aunt went to Dresden. Anna 
Ryder packed everything she possessed into three 
trunks, and one rainy night took her grandmother, 
on the coast of Massachusetts, by surprise. She 
had left everything and gone nowhere, and did 
not care one breath what happened to her next. 

If it were known in God’s world that, from the 
beginning of creation until the end of all things. 
He would forget but one of the creatures He has 
made, would not each of us be sure, at some one 
time in his life, that he was that one? 


IV. 


THE LETTER THAT NEVER WAS MAILED. 

Enjoy the blessings of this day if God sends them, and the 
evils of it bear patiently and sweetly ; for this day only is ours : 
we are dead to yesterday, and we are not yet born to the mor- 
row. — Jeremy Taylor. 

On the top of the sheet was printed, in hand- 
some letters, ‘‘ United States Indian Service,” 
and John Ostermoor wrote with his stub pen, 

‘‘ Fort B , July 21, 18 — ” ; and then the stub 

pen came to a sudden pause. Was it wrong, or 
was it right, to write this letter to Anna Ryder ? 
But she must know something of his life. She 
must know that he had not gone to the dogs, that 
he had only gone to the Indians. 

Then in a dash he started off again: — 

“ My dear Anna., — There is no beginning to 
begin with. Here I am, and at work. Yesterday 
is dead, to-morrow is not born, and here is to-day. 
I have been on a trip up the river and returned 
to the Agency four days ago, since which time I 
have debated and debated whether or not to write 


80 


SECOND BEST, 


to you. I may never do it again, but I have got to 
do it once. I wanted to write while in camp, but, 
being on the go all the time, found it quite impos- 
sible. Perhaps I was glad it was impossible. We 
started from our camp at daybreak and did not 
pitch our tents till dark. Even if I had written 
(as I felt every hour I must,^ for a man can think 
of one thing while he is doing another), I would 
not have been able to send it, for we were fifty 
miles in one direction and one hundred in another 
away from any post-office. 

‘‘Well, we — that is, Joe, the interpreter (the 
‘interrupter,’ as somebody said). White Face, an 
Indian scout, and the clerk (at your service) — 

started from B on the 27th of June. It was 

a lovely morning (as you girls say), our wagon 
was loaded with our tent, saddles, guns, and last, 
but by no means least, that all-important article 
called grub. After travelling about twenty miles, 
I felt an inward craving, and proposed we should 
stop for dinner, which proposal was cheerfully re- 
ceived by my worthy red-skinned companions. W e 
stopped at the mouth of the Little Missouri, a 
beautiful place, — a massive forest as far as the 
eye could reach, one of the good old kind you read 
about. 


THE LETTER, 


81 


“ Joe was cook, and a good one, too. After we 
had satisfied ourselves with a goodly portion of 
coffee, bread, and canned corned beef, and watered 
our horses, which had satisfied themselves with a 
measure of oats apiece, we picked up our traps and 
started off again on our journey. 

‘‘On our way to the Slides, which was our next 
stopping-place, Joe and White Face amused me by 
singing Indian songs, and I, in turn, would sing 
one of my songs, which amused White Face very 
much. I sang the college song about the bull-dog 
on the bank •, and, after it had been interpreted to 
him by Joe, he said he thought the man that com- 
posed that song was a liar, for he never saw a dog 
that could talk, and didn’t know what a monkey ^ 
was, but still he thought the white man’s song 
was pretty good. (If I were a literary fellow, I 
might write up ‘ The Indian on College Songs.’) 
W e would stop now and then, to shoot a rabbit or 
wild duck, and consequently were kept well sup- 
plied with fresh meat. At last we reached the 
Slides, where we camped for the night, — a most 
dreary place. Huge mountains towered above us, 
and the muddy Missouri fiowed below. The place 
derives its name from the sloping land and the 


82 


SECOND BEST. 


vast quantity of earth which is washed away every 
year by the river. 

‘‘After picketing our horses and giving them 
food and water, we pitched our tent, built our 
camp-fire, and Joe went to work to prepare our 
supper, which we were very anxious to get, for 
our long drive of sixty-five miles made us very 
hungry. (Perhaps you think those miles are a 
traveller’s story.) Then, supper over, we got our 
blankets, crawled into our tent, then, rolling our- 
selves up in the blankets, were soon oblivious in 
‘ tired Nature’s sweet restorer, balmy sleep.’ 

“ I was the first one up the following morning, 
— father would find that hard to believe, but, 
‘ strange it is, ’tis true,’ — and, upon going out to 
look around, found that one of the horses had been 
caught by the shoe in the picket rope, and was 
kicking in a most furious manner. I woke the 
boys up, and we did the best we could ; but we 
were not enough to cope with the now infuriated 
beast. We were, indeed, in a plight; and, while 
we stood thinking of what was the best thing to 
do, I looked toward the river, and saw four men 
coming down in a boat. We succeeded in hailing 
them, got them to come ashore, and, after filling 


THE LETTER, 


83 


them with a good breakfast, we asked them to help 
us, which they readily did. We had to throw his 
horse-ship, but got there just the same, and, after 
relieving him of his misery, loaded up our wagon, 
and started for the Knife River, a distance of 
eighty miles from the Agency. 

‘‘There my work commenced. We reached the 
river about two o’clock in the afternoon, and after 
dinner set to work hailing the Indians who are 
camped on the opposite bank of the Missouri 
River. This we did by firing our guns off. We 
did not have to fire many times before the whole 
bank on the opposite side of the river for a quar- 
ter of a mile was lined with Indians. Pretty soon 
I saw them shove something off from shore which 
looked to me very much like a tub, and inside of 
five minutes Mr. Crow-flies-high, and his lady, 
White-Buffalo-calf-woman, ushered themselves into 
our presence. 

“July 28. I was unable to finish this letter, 
having been ordered up to Little Missouri, from 
which place I returned to-day. 

“ Crow-flies-high is chief of the Knife River Ind- 
ians. They do not belong to this Reservation or 
any other. They claim that they do not need the 


84 


SECOND BEST. 


white man’s assistance, and have accepted nothing 
from the government in twenty years. They are 
a bad lot. 

‘‘Well, to go back to the last scene. His 
chief ship grunted and shook hands with me, and 
wanted to know my business. I knew I had a 
hard case before me, so I told Joe to tell him that 
I would be pleased to have himself and lady take 
dinner with us, and after dinner I would tell him 
what I had to say. 

“We all sat down to dinner together, and before 
it was over I was fully convinced that the Chief 
Crow-flies-high had five stomachs, like a cow, and 
that he was trying to fill all five. 

“Well, it got him in a good humor, so, after I 
had given him some tobacco, I told him that, al- 
though he and his tribe had kept away from the 
Reservation, it was the wish of the Great Father 
(the President) for them to come in with the rest 
of the Indians, and to learn the ways of the white 
man, and for that reason he had sent me to get 
their names and try to persuade them to accept 
the hospitality of the government and to do as 
the Great Father wished. 

“ After a good go-as-you-please grunt, he finally 


THE LETTER, 


85 


said that his men wanted nothing to do with the 
white man ; hut he could not talk for them, and 
I would have to go across the river with him, and 
he would hold a council, and find out whether 
his people wanted the Great Father to have their 
names. So, accordingly, Joe and myself, leaving 
White Face to take care of the horses, followed 
the chief and his lady down to the river bank, 
where his boat was in waiting for us. 

“Oh, but what a boat! Nothing but a huge 
tub, made out of a cow-hide stretched over a frame- 
work of stout willows. We had to get to the 
other side somehow. So I jumped boldly in, 
and, with Mrs. White-Buffalo-calf-woman, who 
acted as steam-engine, we were soon safely landed. 

“ The chief took the lead ; and in the centre of 
a group of about one hundred and eighty Indians 
Joe and myself were placed, and marched off to 
the Medicine Lodge, a big, circular building, made 
out of twigs and wood, where the council was to 
be held. These fellows were a savage lot, and 
their dress, which was no dress at all, consisted of 
beads and feathers. They seated themselves in a 
ring in the Medicine Lodge, and Joe and myself 
were placed in the centre of the circle with the 


86 


SECOND BEST, 


chief, who had the floor and talked for an hour, 
after which the Peace Pipe was filled and passed 
to me to light, which I did, and having smoked 
passed it to Joe, who, in turn, passed it to the 
chief, and so on until every man of us had smoked. 
This occupied about three-quarters of an hour, 
during which time not a word was spoken. After 
they had finished smoking, I had the floor, and 
told them just what I had told the chief. They 
Anally agreed to let me take their names, Avhich 
I did. It kept me there until ten o’clock that 
night, writing all the time. 

On our way to the boat the Indians stood in 
a line; and, after shaking hands with about one 
hundred and fifty Indians, — men, women, and 
children, — we shoved off from shore, and were 
soon on our way to camp. 

“ The next morning we started to take the 
names of the Indians on the Fort B Reserva- 

tion. Our Indians are more civilized, and, in con- 
sequence, keep their houses much cleaner than 
the Knife River Indians. I found no trouble in 
taking the census of our Indians ; and everywhere 
I went I was treated with a great deal of respect 
by them. 


THE LETTER. 


87 


“ After travelling about one hundred and sixty 
miles, a part of the time on horseback, I managed 
to visit every house on the Reservation, some 
three hundred in all, and returned to the Agency 
well satisfied with my work, much refreshed by 
my outing, and very much tanned by the sun, my 
face and hands resembling in color the brown side 
of a pancake. I shot two beavers and a deer. 
The deer-skin, Mr. Pawnee Tom will dress. I do 
not know if you will care for all this : it is the 
outside of me, and there is no inside. 

‘‘John Osteumoor.” 

The eight pages were enclosed in a long enve- 
lope, the envelope addressed to her childhood’s 
home, in the care of Mrs. Susan Ellis, Anna’s 
grandmother; and then, with sudden fierceness, 
he tore the envelope in pieces, and trampled the 
pieces under his foot. 

He would not do what he had no right to do. 
He could be generous and true, “black sheep” as 
he was. 

And then he burst into tears, and cried like a 
girl. 


V. 


OSTERMOOR POINT. 

Whatever thou lovest, pray that thou mayst not set too high 
a value upon it.” — Martial. 

“ Take care of the truth, and the errors will take care of them- 
selves.” — Dean Stanley. 

The day John Ostermoor was twenty-five he 
wrote to his father for the first time in years, say- 
ing that he was Avilling to go back to office-work 
and behave himself. His father’s reply was char- 
acteristic : — 

My dear Son ., — The shortest answer is doing. 

‘‘Your affectionate father, 

“David Osteemook.” 

It was three years since the night he rushed out 
of the house and left Anna Ryder to fight out her 
fight alone. He had not spoken to her since, nor 
written to her, unless writing a letter every few 
months and tearing it up may be called writing to 
her. He saAV her standing at a window the morn- ♦ 
ing he went away. He carried the picture with 


OSTERMOOR POINT, 


89 


him, — the green dress he liked, the dark head, 
and her pretty way of holding herself. 

He wrote to his father in the old house on the 
shore, — the house which his great-grandfather 
built a hundred years ago. He thought a letter 
written in the old house would touch his father. 
It was the longest letter he had ever written to 
him. He confessed every wicked thing he had 
done in the past three years, and said he was 
‘‘sorry,” and had told the Lord so before he told 
his father. He knew his father would not believe 
in him, nor in his penitence and determination to 
do better. He did not believe in his father, either. 
He said to himself he was not disappointed in his 
father’s letter; but he sobbed over it like a big, 
heart-broken boy, and if he did not swear it was 
because he kept tight hold of his lips. 

Then he lifted his right hand, and exclaimed, 
through clenched teeth, “ I’ll turn about, if it kills 
me ! ” adding, softened, “ Help me, God.” The 
next day he had a letter from Sophie : — 

Darling Johnny ,, — Your letter has made father 
years younger. He treads like another man. You 
can’t think how white his hair has grown. He 


90 


SECOND BEST. 


looks like an old man, and he isn’t fifty. He cares 
tremendously about things when we think he 
doesn’t care at all. I think he has made himself 
over that way. And he doesn’t trust anybody. I 
am afraid he will love money if something doesn’t 
break his heart soft. Perhaps your letter has 
broken it. I am glad you and I show it when we 
love people. All these three years I have been 
trying hard not to grow like papa. It would kill 
me to be like him. He has never spoken her 
name since I first went to Dresden. At first he 
asked me to tell him everything ; and I was angry 
with her, I could not forgive her, I did not kiss 
her good-by. So I said hard things, and set him 
more than ever against her. I am old enough now 
to think that she has had the hardest time of all. 
And she was innocent. Everybody was innocent, 
till anger and jealousy and unforgiveness came be- 
tween us. Father could have helped by trying to 
understand ; but nobody wanted to understand : 
everybody wanted to be ugly, excepting Anna. 

“I haven’t dared say this before to you. I 
knew all you put in your letter was in you ; but 
I didn’t know it was ready to come out and be 
spoken to. I don’t know what papa wrote to you. 


OSTERMOOR POINT, 


91 


He says you may stay there till he sends for you. 
He will have a place in the business for you. I 
am sure he will care for a letter every week. We 
have never heard from Anna. I wrote to her, in 
Massachusetts, from Paris ; but she has never an- 
swered. I told her I loved her better than ever, 
and how still papa was, and hard,, and that we 
never heard from you. I will fly to you as soon as 
papa says I may. Your 

“Sophie.” 

He had this letter in his pocket the first time he 
saw Leila Provost. It was almost dark, and the 
small steamer “ Alice ” was nearing Ostermoor’s 
Landing. The girl was sitting on a camp-stool, 
looking off across the water. The crowd had 
jostled itself along the plank and on to the new 
wharf two miles below Ostermoor’s, and he and 
this girl were alone on the upper deck. He knew 
she was coming, and, having nothing else to do 
that day, had taken the run into Portland, that he 
might return with her, and become used to her 
before he had to be introduced to her at the house. 
His second cousin, Mrs Frank Ostermoor, had 
given him the girl’s history, as far as she knew it, 


92 


SECOND BEST. 


as soon as Leila wrote to her asking if she might 
come for a “couple of months or longer.” Her 
father died early in the year. She had neither 
brother nor sister. No allusion was made to her 
mother: she must have died long before. John 
watched her, standing with his back toward her, 
turning now and then to gaze at the other shore, 
and was impressed with two or three things about 
her. She was a girl, but a little, wise, old girl, 
more plainly dressed than he had ever seen Sophie 
dressed. He thought she must be a clerk in a 
store, or an operator, — a type- writer. That small, 
thin hand, fingering her silk gloves with restless, 
bare fingers, had a deal of something in it. She 
might be nothing ; but she was somebody, and 
nobody could stand next to her and not feel it. 
Not pretty at all, and he was hardly disappointed, 
she was so interesting. 

He had pictured her to himself, and told Mrs. 
Ostermoor that he would go across the way to 
board if he did not like her. She would wear 
flimsy, fine dresses, and rave about the rocks and 
water, and pester him to teach her to row and 
fish, and scream when the fish swallowed the 
hook, and hide her eyes until he cut the hook out ; 


OSTERMOOR POINT. 


93 


and she would have a pile of sensational novels, 
and be always munching candy and writing let- 
ters and plaguing somebody to go to the mail ! 
But this little thing, in the plain dress of dark 
blue that he knew would wash, with a straw hat 
shading a face pale and plain, with hollow eyes 
and fingers like bird’s claws with not one ring, 
did not answer at all to his mental photograph. 
One trunk seemed to contain all her worldly 
goods, — a trunk, a yellow leather bag, a silk um- 
brella, a paper package ; and the paper package 
did not look like candy. 

If some one did not meet them with a boat, 
they would have to walk the quarter of a mile 
through the fields. The grass was tall and wet, 
and those neat Oxford ties were not protected 
with rubbers. 

But the small ‘‘ Alice ” was giving a most un- 
earthly shriek as she neared the landing ; and 
there was Frank with his boat, waiting for the 
travellers. 

Frank ran up the steps of the landing and stood 
before the strangers, wriggling with shyness from 
the tip of his bare toes to the top of his red head. 
Leila laughed, and it was such a musical, frank 


94 


SECOND BEST. 


laugh that John laughed, and, lifting his hat, said 
easily : I know you are Miss Provost. I am 

John Ostermoor, cousin to this small boatman, 
and that boat at the foot of the steps is the jolly 
little ‘‘ Codfish ” ; and, if you will embark with us, 
we will row you to Ostermoor Point.” 

“ And my trunk ? ” 

That will take another trip.” 

The introduction was over, and now for friend- 
liness ; but that was not at all a matter of course. 
Leila did not speak another word until she said, 
‘‘ Thank you,” when John helped her over the 
rocks at the foot of the lawn. 


VI. 


THE OTHER SIDE OF HER. 

I am glad to think I am not bound to make the world go right, 
but only to discover and to do with cheerful heart the work that 
God appoints. — Jean Ingelow. 

How Leila Provost happened to be on the way 
to Ostermoor Point is a little story in itself. The 
immediate cause of it was one of her passionate 
exclamations : — 

“ O papa, I believe I should die without luxu- 
ries ! If I can’t do as I like, I don’t want to do 
at all.” 

The exclamation was a year old before her 
father replied, and then his steadied, pained voice 
brought her to his side, and her head low on the 
arm of his invalid chair. 

“ Tell me, papa, all you think about me, and 
what you want me to do. I know I am growing 
narrow and selfish, am cultivating my tastes, and 
growing away from hard, healthy things. I have 
pampered and petted myself into a spoiled child, 
and am not growing into the woman you admire. 


96 


SECOND BEST, 


I know it ; I see it in your eyes. Tell me how to 
stop myself and turn around the other way.” 

“You have made it easy for me to speak, dear. 
I have pondered and prayed. I knew you were 
being spoiled, and that I had helped do it by in- 
judicious fondness and leaving you to your own 
pretty ways. You are as delightful to me as the 
perfume of heliotrope ; but I would rather my 
daughter would be wheat, and ground into coarse 
flour to make a common loaf.” 

She did not lift her head while he talked. 

“You are nearly twenty-three. I want you to 
do something for me. I want you to go to Oster- 
moor Point, — where I had two hard years when I 
was a boy, — and begin there the life I purpose for 
you. Life was good for me there, — hard, rough, 
with necessities that had to be met by something 
in myself. On the rocks and by the sea, with that 
sky above you, that glorious night sky above you, 
and that salt air about you, you will be lifted up 
out of your small self into the ivide self that is 
being smothered in you. Your soul has crept into 
a shell. The life I have encouraged in you and 
the atmosphere I have thrown around you have 
not been for the growth of the best. You know 


THE OTHER SIDE OF HER. 


97 


your faults — they have grown as rank as weeds 
in richest soil. I’ve thought so much about that 
place and the strong, true life of it, that it comes 
back to me when I sleep ; and, when that hard pain 
grinds and grinds, I find myself looking out in the 
dusk from my garret window at the revolving 
light, and just now I was rowing and dropped my 
oar and awoke. When you step lightly, thinking 
me asleep, I am awake, in the pine woods or on 
the rocks. I never took you there, — our life has 
been too full, — and I never talked much about it. 
The best of you is not going out : it is straitened 
and cramped with luxurious living and intellectual 
tastes. Because your tastes are fine and strong, 
you follow them. Your desires and inclinations 
master you. You are made of cultivated tastes. 
You are almost cultivated to death, — to the 
death of something better in you. You lavish 
your income upon yourself, and turn and borrow 
of papa when it falls short, knowing that he will 
never put you in prison for debt. Twelve hun- 
dred a year and your board, and in debt to papa. 
To-day I overheard you say that you felt 'poor., 
you wanted so many things. I can think of but 
one way for you to grow wider, — to grow in the 


98 


SECOND BEST 


ways in which you are dwarfed. I had decided to 
go with you, and buy a house on the shore, or 
build one, and begin a frugal, industrious life ” — 
O papa, you hard worker! ” she interrupted. 

“ I want you not to hate housekeeping and small 
things and poor things and doing without things 
and giving the hard service of yourself, I want 
you to be poor, that you may make yourself and 
others rich.” 

‘‘Would you take my money away from me?” 
she asked, reproachfully. 

“ God gave it to you through your mother. 
Your father has not the right to take it away from 
you. God does not take it from you : He is even 
giving you more. Your income will be doubled 
after my death, — only doubled: the rest I have 
given away, if a man gives what he leaves and 
cannot take with him, as somebody says. No: I 
would not dare take one dollar from you. I only 
dare help you to learn how to use it, and in using 
it to use something better, — yourself. You are 
better to use than your money ; you are better to 
give than your money. You must learn how to give 
yourself and use yourself, and then your money 
will help you grow and help somebody else to grow, 


THE OTHER SIDE OF HER. 


99 


You give money freely, too freely: you give it as if 
it were the best and only thing to give. I want you 
to put to use everything in you, — the whole of 
yourself. The things you hate are the things you 
have left undone. I want you to read the unread 
books, make friends with the unloved people ; to 
furnish every empty nook and corner of yourself; 
to do the things that have been crowded out. It 
will take time and work, tears and prayers, and as 
much clear grit as your little self is possessed of. 

‘‘ It will be an easy thing to be poor and abased 
where people know you are rich and have an 
honored position. If people think you have lost 
your money, — you will not be false if you do not 
tell them all that you and I are trying to do. You 
are poor, you are to be poor for a certain length 
of time. And, I beg of you, do not borrow. Earn| 
money if you must, but do not exceed your in- 
come. What can you live on?” 

Fifteen hundred,” she said, with a mischievous 
laugh. 

“ Try again,” he returned, gravely. 

‘‘Eight hundred,” she tried again, after a mo- 
ment of swift calculation; “but, oh, what kind 
of a life would it be?” 


100 


SECOND BEST, 


‘‘My daughter, my spoiled little daughter! I 
wish you to be useful and healthy and growing 
on a dollar a day, — three hundred and sixty-five 
dollars a year.” 

Had her father lost his mind? Must she obey 
him if he had lost his mind ? She drew a long, 
hard breath, then burst into choking tears. But 
tears would trouble him. She looked up to smile, 
her own saucy self, and to say she would give her 
money to the American Board, and put herself 
into a mission fair, and be sold for a sixpence, 
which was more than she was worth. 

“And your body to be burned,” he said, seri- 
ously, “and then you would be nothing.” 

“Papa, I shall have no pleasure in life,” she 
said, vehemently. 

“One can worship gold without making it into 
a golden image. After you have turned yourself 
about, and looked upon the wider horizon of your 
life, with your knowledge of yourself, what you 
can do and what you cannot do, you will learn, 
what you so often bemoan you have not learned, 
what you are/cr.^” 

“And what my money is for,” she added, peni- 
tently. “But, papa, I can’t travel on a dollar a 
day.” 


THE OTHER SIDE OF HER, 


101 


“ Only on your feet.” 

How long — do you think ? ” 

‘‘ I had three years in my mind : it will take the 
first year to learn how to make the best of the 
second.” 

It took all her self-control to keep the sobs 
down. Her very fingers trembled with the effort, 
and the nerves sent a shock to her brain that gave 
her a stinging headache. 

“You are stronger than you look. You are 
never ill. You can walk and climb like a boy. 
If you should be ill and need money, do not hesi- 
tate to use all you need and wish : use your wis- 
dom about it in every emergency. Can you stand 
it three years ? ” 

“ Some girls stand it a lifetime,” she muttered ; 
“but they did not begin as I did. Every breath 
has been breathed in the air of luxury.” 

“ How glad I would be to live to see my daugh- 
ter, my little, only daughter,” he said, stroking 
back the hair from her temples with thin, hot 
fingers, “a rounded, finished, well-proportioned 
woman, wide as the world’s needs in her sympa- 
thies, and wide as the heavens above in her out 
look and up look! Your father’s fondness and 


102 


SECOND BEST. 


your mother’s money have come near spoiling the 
beautiful workmanship God so wisely began. Do 
not promise — I would not bind you against 
your will” — 

“ I could not promise to-day : it is more dread- 
ful than you can think. The world would be 
empty to me.” 

‘‘Would heaven be empty,” he asked, compas- 
sionately, “if God should take these things from 
you? — if He should ask you to deny yourself?'' 

She shivered with the tense self-control, then 
tears relieved her. She had to let go her self- 
control for a while, if she did worry papa. He let 
her sob herself into quietness, then, when she was 
still, she arose and went away. 

He did not press the matter again ; and she did 
not promise. She was afraid she would break her 
promise. But in the three months that he lived 
he noted changes that pleased him. 

“My grandmother was an Ostermoor,” he said, 
one day. “ The Ostermoors built on Cousin’s 
Island nearly two hundred years ago. When I 
was a boy, a part of the house was standing. Then 
the third John Ostermoor built the house on the 
point opposite the island. It is not a mile across. 


THE OTHER SIDE OF HER. 


103 


There is a strip of sandy beach on the island. 
Y on are a good boat-woman ; you can have your 
boat and row across. I took your mother away 
from her relatives, — she was not nineteen, — and 
she died in two years. So you have never known 
any one on her side. I met David Ostermoor once 
in London. He is a cousin several times removed, 
but I had no time to meet him again. He has 
children. You may find it good to know the 
Ostermoors.” 

Leila never knew the exact moment of her turn- 
ing-point. It was not what she was at that mo- 
ment that turned her about, but the something 
she had been growing into all her life. 

For, with all her hindrances, she had been grow- 
ing. 

But, then, what would she do if one of her old 
fits of the blues ” should get hold of her and 
keep tight hold of her? She would not know 
how to free herself. She would have nothing 
that she loved, or nothing new, to run into, and 
get away from herself. 

Ostermoor Point was something new: that was 
the name the country people gave to the point of 
land, with its jutting border of rocks, on which 


104 


SECOND BEST. 


the old house was built. ‘‘The Foreside,” the 
village people called the shore, — “Yarmouth 
Foreside.” The village was Yarmouth; besides, 
there were Yarmouth ville and Yarmouth Junction. 

“The Foreside” was all she cared for: it was 
two weeks before she thought of a walk to the 
village. 

While she did not love the house, but for its 
old-time story, she loved everything outside of it. 
The shore and the pine woods were her refuge 
every hour of the day and as late at night as she 
dared. She made friends with all the rocks along 
the coast of Yarmouth Foreside. 

Some one else loved the rocks. 

At first she was provoked that her tramps should 
be intruded upon; and then she was only half- 
provoked, and wholly curious. The intruder in- 
terested her. 

She had spelled out his name one day on a 
weather-worn gray stone, kneeling on the grass 
in the Indian burying-ground, and scraping away 
with her penknife the gray and green moss from 
inside and outside the rudely-cut letters. This 
John Ostermoor died in 1732. One morning in 
the last of July, one hundred and fifty years later, 


THE OTHER SIDE OF HER. 


105 


another John Ostermoor stood beside her on a 
rock : he stood, idly dipping the bronze toe of his 
walking shoe into the clear, warm pool in the sun- 
shiny rock. As he stood there, watching the 
movement of his foot, with his coarse straw hat 
pushed back from his round, healthily-browned 
face, he looked like a big boy, as much like a big 
boy as his companion, in her short gingham dress, 
with a sash of the same material, tied in long, 
careless loops, and broad brown straw hat, looked 
like a little girl. She had guessed his age to be 
twenty-two, and had seen and heard nothing to 
change her estimate. Twenty-two was boyishness 
to her ladyship of twenty-three. 

The curly, light hair, growing thick over his 
head, added to his boyishness. His big, wide-open 
blue eyes, meeting yours so frankly, were a boy’s 
eyes, — a boy’s eyes, with a steadfast soul in them. 
His mouth, when he was merry, stern, sad, or angry, 
was worth studying, — so, perhaps, it was worth 
studying most of the time. He stood “ in his stock- 
ings,” as he told her, six feet and half an inch. 
His gray flannel shirt and blue flannel tie were a 
part of his careless, out-of-door life, very becoming 
Leila had decided. She had decided, in her quick 
way, a great many things about him. 


106 


SECOND BEST, 


One was that he lacked finish. He was not as 
gentle as she loved her gentlemen friends to be. 
His brusque manner and impetuous words would 
have displeased her, were they not so essentially 
himself. The rough-and-ready look of his gray 
flannel and coarse hat was an attractive part of 
him : he certainly had the finish that belonged to 
gray flannel. 

She had been deceived and disappointed in peo- 
ple several times in her twenty-three years. She 
had resolved never to be disappointed in John 
Ostermoor, for the safe reason that she would 
never expect anything of him. He had led a wild 
life, she knew, and the flavor of it was about him 
still. He talked slang; he wore his hat in the 
house ; he as often ate with his knife as his fork, 
and when he did use his fork he would load it up 
with his knife ; he went out in his boat on Sunday. 
Still, she liked to be with him, in some of his 
moods : she had never seen any one so swayed 
by ‘‘moods.” He could be five people in five 
hours ; even if she hated four of them, she was 
so attracted to the fifth that she forgave the others. 

She was very sure she was safe in not being dis- 
appointed in him: she understood him too thor- 
oughly. 


THE OTHER SIDE OF HER. 


107 


“I do believe in people so ! ” she exclaimed after 
a silent five minutes. 

Neither cared about the silent minutes that often 
fell between them. 

-‘I never can believe that the people I admire 
and depend upon are changeable — like me.” 

She ended with a laugh : it was the silver music 
in her voice that made him care to talk to her, — 
that, and the frankness that told the truth and ex- 
torted the truth. 

“ I do not believe in anybody on this earth,” he 
answered. 

“Not in yourself?” 

“In myself least of all. Yes: I do believe in 
my sister — when she is left to have a mind of her 
own.” 

“ Then how can you expect any one to believe 
in you?” she questioned. 

“ I don’t. I warn people off : no tresspassing 
on the territory of me.” 

“I try to believe in myself. I do until I find 
out the next unexpected wickedness. There isn’t 
much of me, but it is real. My selfishness is very 
real. I am talking to you now for my own sake, 
not for yours.” 


108 


SECOND BEST, 


“ You think it wouldn’t do any good to talk for 
mine. You are right there. And it’s a fact, there 
isn’t much of you to believe in.” 

There was not ‘‘much” from a physical stand- 
point. Practice in the gymnasium had straight- 
ened out her crookedness. Two years ago she 
was round-shouldered and hollow-chested. John 
Ostermoor thought she was unpleasingly both to- 
day. He admired a girl as plump as a cherry, 
as straight as an arrow, as rosy as a peach. This 
girl was pale and clear-skinned, with blue-gray 
eyes, and long lashes that darkened the color of 
her eyes. Her hair was a dull brown, and ar- 
ranged with no art to improve the shape of her 
projecting forehead. She was not, as she often 
said to herself, “one bit pretty.” She was not 
SAveet: she was only real. In her frankness she 
gave the worst of herself as openly as she gave the 
best of herself. The motto of her life was : No 
one shall ever he disappointed in me. She did not 
love readily. She called herself a “ good hater.” 

She laughed as he spoke, remembered her dis- 
satisfaction when she found him, the morning after 
her coming, at the foot of the lawn, stretched out 
in the sun, on a flat rock. 


THE OTHER SIDE OF HER. 


109 


“ Then you don’t like human beings ? ” she said. 

“ I am making the best of them till I can get 
rid of them.” 

It must be some fun and some trouble to make 
the best — of anybody,” she replied, with demure 
mischief. 

‘‘ I wish you wouldn’t take my words up so,” he 
returned, crossly, — as crossly as a big boy, she 
, mentally concluded. 

“Excuse me,” with marked courtesy, “bat I 
thought you threw them down to be taken up. 
Is it the so you object to ? ” 

He laughed his crossness away, and asked her 
if she would like to take a walk. 

“ I left the house for that very purpose.” 

“Where shall we go, then?” he asked, eagerly. 

“ I am not sure that I shall like to take a walk 
with you,” she said, gravely, stooping to dip her 
fingers into the sunshiny pool. 

“You cannot be sure till you try. You haven’t 
taken one walk with me,” he urged. 

“ I am not willing to try this morning. I am 
cross-grained, as you see. I should pick to pieces 
everything you said. I wish to be all by myself 
this morning.” 


no 


SECOND BEST, 


“What on earth do you want to be so much 
alone for?” he inquired, irritably. 

“Because I am never so little alone as when 
alone. I have to talk things over with my new 
self.” 

“ Your new self! Don’t be tragic and mysteri- 
ous, pray I ” 

“ I am new every morning to myself.” 

“I wish I was. I was going with you to get 
rid of myself.” 

“Shuffle yourself off some other way,” she said, 
good-humoredly. 

The charm this girl had for him no other girl 
ever had had. He could talk to her without in 
the least giving offence, in any sort of mood he 
chanced to be. Often he was as brusque to her as 
he would have been to Joe, the interpreter; and 
she seemed to understand that it was only a nat- 
ural bit of himself. She certainly could not have 
been more herself had he been her youngest 
brother. He told himself that she was an ugly 
little thing, sharp, and not sweet; and he could by 
no possibility ever fall in love with her, and that 
she was “ too much fun.” 

And she had confided to herself that he was a 


THE OTHER SIDE OF HER, 


111 


rough, big fellow, with a vein of sweetness run- 
ning through him, with considerable intelligence 
and little education, had probably seen no good 
society, and would never be anything but a good 
comrade with all sorts of people, and life would 
be unendurable, if she had to think of him as any- 
thing besides a chance acquaintance ; she could not 
even imagine a warm friendship. She did not 
believe he had ever read a book through in his 
life. It was certainly the other side of her that 
was tolerating this every-day companionship. 

“It is low tide. I will run along on the rocks, 
and play in the sea-weed.” 

“You will slip,” he warned. 

“ Then I’ll learn not to slip next time.” 

“ You’d better take me,” he coaxed. 

“ To keep you from slipping ? ” 

“That is what girls are for,” he said, with strong 
bitterness ; “ and then they push us over.” 

“ Don’t hate girls : it’s cynical. How many 
girls do you know ? ” she asked, curiously. ^ 

“Not one nowadays. I used to know dozens. 
I do not even know my sister. I have not seen 
my only sister for three years.” 

“Is she ashamed of you?” she asked, lightly, 
playing in the pool with both hands. 


112 


SECOND BEST. 


She has reason to be. She has my father to 
be proud of. And she herself has nothing to do 
but to be charming.” 

“ I’m glad I don’t have to be that,” said Leila, 
lifting herself and holding her wet hands out in 
the sunshine. 

He was sure she did not expect to be told that 
she did not have to be, because she was that al- 
ready : it was a relief for flattery and compliment 
not to be expected of him. All his life he had 
said pretty things ” to all the girls he knew. 

‘‘ When you think you understand a person, 
how do you know you do ? ” were his next slow, 
emphatic words. ‘‘If I understood people as” — 
he waited for his word until the exact word came 
— “ misinterpretingly as they understand me, I 
might as well give up understanding people alto- 
gether. Do you care whether you are understood 
or not?” he asked, with great seriousness. 

“ Yes : I care a great deal. I am in terror of 
giving a false impression of myself.” 

“What do you do about it?” hs asked, boy- 
ishly. 

“ If one would not be taken wrongly, he must 
give himself rightly. It is very weak to keep 


THE OTHER SIDE OF HER. 


113 


one’s self to one’s self and then say bitter things 
about being misinterpreted. Blame yourself for 
not giving yourself, or only one side of yourself. 
Who can take what you do not give ? ” 

“You think I am a milk-and-water sort of fel- 
low, I know.” 

“You are not as harmless as that,” she said, 
with a laugh that took the sting out of her words. 
“ You have stirred some bitter drops in.” 

“ Somebody poured bitter drops in ! How do 
you make yourself easy to be understood?” 

“Who said I did?” she asked, sharply. 

“ I thought you were the kind to do what you 
thought you ought,” he answered, rebuked. 

“When I write a letter, I endeavor to write 
plainly and put my thoughts clearly. You know 
we are ‘ living epistles.’ ” 

“ That sounds like the Bible. But living is 
different from letter-writing, and that is plague 
enough. We don’t like to put ourselves clearly, 
even the few times we know how.” 

As he spoke, he stepped down to the rock 
below. She followed him, talking earnestly. She 
loved to talk. 

“We do hide ourselves in such a coat-of-mail : 


114 


SECOND BEST, 


isn’t it queer? We resent being understood, I 
truly believe, as really as being misunderstood. I 
know I wouldn’t tell you all I am thinking now for 
a sixpence. Any man, in doing a work that some 
one does not understand, is in that measure, and 
by that some one, misunderstood. But who ever 
said that the end of life was in being understood? 
What do you want to be understood /or ” 

“I don’t. Did I say I did?” he laughed, 
springing across from one rock to another. Again 
she followed, stepping carefully on the sea-weed. 

‘‘I suppose I would take to my heels,” he 
added, “if you could see half my heart.” 

“ And I know I never should dare look you in 
the face if you could see mine.” 

And then both laughed, — a boy and girl laugh 
of great amusement. 

“ I am in earnest,” she protested. 

“I never was more so. I don’t see anything 
funny in it,” he said, turning to give her his hand. 
“Step there! Now! You’ll be a chamois, in 
time.” 

“ The funny is in confessing it, I suppose,” she 
said, again standing beside him ; “ and then, if it 
be true, in having a certain relish for the compan- 


THE OTHER SIDE OF HER, 


115 


ionship of one whose inside self we — don’t like. 
What are your besetting sins ? ” 

It was a queer question for a girl to ask him ; 
but, perhaps, it was not queer for this small-sized 
philosopher of a girl, who had a way of not choos- 
ing the usual topics of conversation. 

He laughed, — that was the easiest answer, — 
and then his eyes darkened, and he frowned. 

I have never known self-control. I have been 
controlled by other people. My father has kept 
me under, and somebody else. She controlled me 
by a touch of her hand or a motion of her lips. 

I wasn’t my own self : I was what she willed me 
to be. Then, having been turned off, like a black 
sheep that had no right to the fold, I went off 
where I had no restraint, and I could be as bad * 
and uncivilized as I wanted to be. Then I had to 
control myself, or let myself go; and, when a 
fellow lets go of himself, he can swing off to 
destruction easier than he can breathe. I don’t 
know why I’m not a drunkard to-day. I don’t 
know why I’m not as dreadful to you as an Ind- 
ian in beads and feathers, — leaving out the pict- 
uresque. Perhaps I am. I came from the wild 
West this spring.” 


116 


SECOND BEST, 


“Then that explains — you,” she returned, im- 
pressively. “ I thought something did.” 

“ I do not feel that I am nothing, as somebody 
once told me to : I feel that I am something, and 
something hadP 

He ran off over the rocks, and she threw a 
laughing “Good-by” after him. He climbed up 
the bank and strode through the pine-trees into 
the wood. She kept on along the rocks and the 
sea-weed. 

In these days, she was happiest in motion. She 
was restless when she rested: she felt that she 
must be after something. 

Brushing through the pines, John exclaimed 
aloud and angrily : “ I know I do offend her taste. 
She has a touch like a rose-leaf, and she shrivels 
away from me like a sensitive plant ! But I am 
as I was made — and so’s a toad.” 

Her thought of him, put into words, was : “ A 
father to be proud of, a sister that is charming, 
and somebody who moved him at her will to 
throw him off, — and then the wild W est ! That 
explains him.” 


VII. 


SOMEBODY ELSE. 

‘*Not only do we not know God v/ithout Jesus Christ, we do 
not know ourselves without Him.” — Pascal. 

“ It is good for us to think no grace or blessing truly ours till 
we are aware that God has blessed some one else with it through 
us .” — Phillips Brooks. 

Another somebody else loved her rocks. 

As she stood looking off across the bay to the 
sandy beach and the green slope of Cousin’s Isl- 
and, she heard the dipping of oars. A moment 
later, the keel of a boat grated on the shore. 

Cornelius Arnold spent all his days and many 
hours of his nights out on the water. Mrs. Oster- 
moor advised him to ^‘camp out” on the water. 
She said she wondered he could breathe on land. 
He had been out since dawn, kindling a fire and 
heating his coffee on the beach of Cousin’s Island. 
Leila stood still, to watch his movements. 

‘‘Has anything happened to the water?” she 
asked, gravely, as he stepped over the sea-weed 
toward her. 


118 


SECOND BEST, 


‘‘ No : it is as wet as ever. I suppose I can come 
ashore.” 

‘‘ As the fish said when he climbed a tree ! ” 

‘‘ I came for supplies.” 

“ ‘ Society is no comfort 
To one not sociable/ ” 

she quoted. 

am very sociable. To tell the truth, I’m 
tired of being alone. I’d rather stay with you 
than stay alone, to-day,” he retorted, as mischiev- 
ous as herself. 

“ As I would rather stay with myself than stay 
alone, I sympathize with you.” 

He looked worn. He threw himself down upon 
the rock where Leila stood, and pulled his broad 
hat over his eyes. 

“ Don’t be frightened away. Sit down,” he said. 

She loved to talk with him. Once he had spent 
a week at her father’s house ; her father believed 
in him and admired him. Two 'weeks ago she 
found him at the supper-table. She had forgotten 
that a new boarder had been announced ; and then 
to find Cornelius Arnold ! It was a bright ending 
to a very ‘‘ blue ” day. 


SOMEBODY ELSE. 


119 


She sat down near him. She liked to watch his 
face when he talked. She told herself again that 
he was almost the handsomest man she ever saw, 
— such shades of brown in his hair and eyes and 
glossy beard. 

In him she recognized her ideal. She was not 
afraid he would ever disappoint her. She would 
not change him to-day one atom. He was even 
her ideal teacher, and that was saying more than 
that he was her ideal in his handsome presence, 
his courtesy and kindliness, in his intellectual 
tastes, and in the habit of his daily living. She 
had not seen the girl he married. If she were his 
counterpart, she would have to be her ideal 
woman. “ What women these Christians have ! ” 
exclaimed the pagan, in the history of the early 
Church. 

“ Months of idleness and weariness ! Out of 
doors from morning till night ! And this the 
penalty of unconscious overwork. In the grave- 
yard on the way to the village is a monument 
erected to the memory of an old man who was 
forty-three years minister of this parish, — forty- 
three years of work ! And five of rushing and 
pushing were too much for me.” 


120 


SECOND BEST. 


“You were over-strained when you began ! ” she 
interrupted. 

“ And your father warned me, and all my 
friends. Why do you suppose God did not give 
me the mental strength He gave his disciples when 
He sent them out ? ” 

“ Peter and James and John had lived in a boat 
and got their strength first. It wasn’t school and 
college with them first.” 

“And working hard and taking prizes every 
year ; but I was eighteen when I entered college. 
I had to work.” 

“ Where were you before that ? ” 

“ Fighting mental weakness. I never could sit 
up all night to read or write.” 

“ But you have those working years to be glad 
about,” she said, pityingly. 

“ I wish I had the faith and patience to be glad 
about anything. She is hopeful. She has known 
me three years, and longer, in strength and in 
weakness. At first I begged the Lord to let me 
do something, and then anything ; and now I have 
to beg to be willing to do nothing.” 

“ Oh, dear ! ” ejaculated Leila. “ I don’t see 
how you can be willing.” 


SOMEBODY ELSE. 


121 


His hat was shading his eyes. She was glad he 
could not see her face. She drew up her knees 
and rested her chin on them, in a comical fashion 
she had, and turned her eyes from him to look at 
the shining water. 

“Down to the time of Simon the Just,” he 
began, in his ordinary tone, “ the red thread 
around the neck of the scape-goat turned white, 
as a sign that the sins of the people were for- 
given.” 

“ Oh, what a comfort ! ” Leila sighed. “ I wish 
I could see something like that. I’m all mixed up 
and in the dark.” 

“ Matthew Henry says,” the quiet voice went 
on, “ whatever God gives you in a promise be sure 
to send back to him in a prayer.” 

The face resting on the blue and red gingham 
knees brightened. She made no reply other than 
this, and this he did not see. 

His next words were in reply to his own dis- 
couraged thinking : — 

“ Moses and Paul and Elijah were sent to the 
same place, — the desert. They did good work 
after that.” 

“ I am in my desert,” said Leila. “ I am glad 


122 


SECOND BEST. 


you said that, Mr. Arnold. I am always glad 
when you say things.” 

That is what worries me. Why can’t I ‘say 
things ’ connectedly, and say them to young men 
growing into strong manhood ? ” 

“ I suppose that God knows,” said Leila, shyly, 
thinking that the commonplace truth held full 
comfort. 

“ The trouble is, /‘want to know,” he returned 
impatiently. 

Often she did not trace any connection between 
his thought of one moment and the thought of the 
next. She wished she might live in his brain and 
travel from one thought to another. Mental phi- 
losophy was one of her delights. 

“ Just think of one angel saying to another, 
‘ Run, speak to this young man.’ I wish I could 
speak forcibly to the young man with us.” 

And do tell him to eat with his fork,” Leila 
burst out, vehemently, “ and not to wear his hat in 
the sitting-room while he Avrites a letter, and make 
him keep out of his boat on Sundays.” 

‘'^He’s been let loose somewhere. He belongs 
to good people.” 

“ I wish he would show it,” she said, irritably. 


SOMEBODY ELSE, 


123 


The reason he has so many faults is because 
there is so much in him.” 

“Well — yes — I suppose that may be true,” 
she conceded. “I am surprised now and then 
with a vein of real refinement that runs through 
his roughness. He isn’t like any one I ever saw. 
He amuses me and provokes me. He makes you 
think of him whether you care to or not.” 

“ I care to — very much. Boys are my work in 
life, you remember.” 

“ What shall you do with him? ” 

“ Let him alone, if I can. I am greatly in fear 
of interfering with work God has begun.” 

“ When he comes to you, you cannot throw him 
off. I think the angel has told you to speak to 
tlii% young man.” 

“ He is a fine fellow. He’s made of good tim- 
ber.” 

“ I might think so, but he makes me so angry. 
I hate slang,” exclaimed Leila, crossly. “ Some- 
times he’s so rude he makes the creeps run up 
my back.” 

“ Tell him so,” he suggested. 

“ I shall before I know it.” 

“ I think the Lord sends us to people to prepare 


124 


SECOND BEST, 


them for his coming. He sent his disciples ‘ into 
the villages into which he himself would come.’ ” 
Leila pondered, with eyes that her companion 
would have been glad to see. If Christ would 
only send her into some heart into which he him- 
self would come ! She was sure she had never 
brought one sorrowing, or one sinning, to Christ. 
That didn’t take money. 

“ Mr. Arnold, the disciples were not rich.” 

‘‘ One night he continued all night in prayer,” 
began the voice under the hat, joyfully ; and 
when it was day he called his disciples, and chose 
twelve from among them, whom also he named 
apostles. His first recorded words to them, the 
first Luke tells us, are wonderful to me : ‘ Blessed 
are ye poor,'" I am poor.” 

Leila almost wished she were poor. She was 
glad she had to be poor awhile, to learn some oi\ 
its blessedness. ' 

‘‘ He did not choose any woman to follow him 
and be his disciple,” she said, in a moment. 

“ He told the woman at the well that he was 
the Messiah before he told even Peter or John.” 

“ I am glad,” she answered, speaking only half 
her thought. Do you think he would have told 


SOMEBODY ELSE, 


125 


a rich young woman what he told the rich young 
ruler, to give up all his possessions and follow 
him?” 

When the possessions interfere, he says that to 
every one of us : if one dollar interferes, — comes 
between us and him, — he bids us let it go.” 

Leila grew rebellious in a moment: she had 
had not let go. 

But if gold and silver make a bond between, 
blessed be gold and silver,” he exclaimed, de- 
voutly. 

“ I should love gold and silver if it could make 
them that,” she answered. 

“ That is the only right you have to love that, 
or anything, or anybody,” he said. 

How his thoughts run through his brain like 
burning threads ! How they hurried and thronged, 
jostling each other in and out, making sense and 
— nonsense. If he should attempt to write them, 
no pencil could move fast enough. 

But his brain was tired to-day : when was it not 
tired? Living in a boat would cure him, the 
doctors said. W as he not living in a boat ? And 
they had sent him away, even from his wife. He 
must make the change as radical as going into 


126 


SECOND BEST, 


a new world. He must not do anything he had 
ever done before, and he must do everything he 
liad never done before. 

In early Bible times, a man was permitted to 
stay with his wife one year, and not required in 
that year to go to war, nor charged with any busi- 
ness, but only to stay or be home and cheer up the 
Avife he had taken. He had not had his year. 
His work was snatched from his hands, and he 
Avas only thirty-three. But did not Christ, Avho 
kneAV all God’s will and did it, end his life among 
men at thirty-three ? What did God Avant of 
his years now — of the years that he would give 
him more than He gave His Son? 

Leila did not stir at his sigh that deepened into 
a groan. It Avas her daily study hoAv to be bright 
enough to interest him and yet not demand any- 
thing of his beAvildered brain. He rarely spoke 
of his Avife. He told Leila he Avas as homesick 
for her as a tAVO years’ old child. She had gone 
abroad with friends, and he had promised her that 
he would ‘‘behave and grow strong.” Her travel- 
ling expenses were paid, and she receded a salary 
as governess to a girl of tAvelve. Her small an- 
nuity, the income from the feAV thousands she had 


SOMEBODY ELSE. 


127 


when she became his wife, was his support. 
When he told her that her money burned him, 
she said, ‘‘The more it burns, the less you love 
me.” 

Leila was touched by his gladness at finding 
herself : — 

“You can write my letters for me: that was my 
sorrow. How could I tell her everything when I 
could trust no one to write for me ? ” 

Yesterday she had filled four sheets at his dicta- 
tion. The postscript he wrote himself, and “ My 
Beloved ” at the beginning, after Leila’s work was 
finished. Even a short letter would cost him three 
days of mental weariness ; and he had not one 
hour to lose. Must he not be ready to go to 
some small country home with her when her year 
abroad was ended ? 

No one could “understand” why she had 
chosen to go so far away. Why had she not 
stayed at home, and at least within a day’s jour- 
ney of him ? And then Leila heard another groan. 
How could people understand when they did not 
know that his wife must earn her own bread and 
butter if she gave him her inherited money? 

“Leila, do you love money?” he asked, ab- 
ruptly. 


128 


SECOND BEST. 


“Yes,” Leila answered readily. “I always 
thought I was above loving it : noAV I know I do. 
Oh, I could do so many things I want to do, if I 
had — more money.” 

He believed that her father’s income had died 
with him, and that she had been left unprovided 
for. When he knew her father he lived in fine 
style, and Lelia appeared to have everything any 
girl could desire. He was not surprised. Even 
wise fathers, thinking their hold upon life secure, 
gratified their children to-day at the cost of to- 
morrow. 

This girl’s to-morrow was hard and plain; the 
cost must be as much as she could pay. 

“ ‘ Blessed be ye poor,’ ” he quoted. 

“ That is what I want, — the blessing of it.” 

“ That is what I am afraid of losing by fretting 
against it,” he said. 

She did not believe that he ever fretted. 

“ And yet I do want to help God do His will 
with me,” he added. 

“ I want to — but I don’t,” she acknowledged. 
“If I have strength to work, and am taken care 
of while I work, what do I want money for, but 
to give away? But I do want it for something 


SOMEBOJ^Y ELSE. 


129 


else ; and I do not discover anything to do with 
myself or anybody in this wild place.” 

I suppose Paul hadn’t time to spend money,” 
he went on, in a musing voice, not even to give 
it away. Money was not good enough for him to 
use. Peter and John said, ‘Silver and gold have 
I none.’ Why did not the Lord give them money 
to give away? ” 

“ Do you know ? ” she asked. 

“Because he gave them something better to 
give.” 

“ Doesn’t he sometimes give the money and the 
something better with it ? ” was her quick answer. 

“Not to many — not to most. There are gifts 
differing.” 

“ You would rather have a strong head than a 
million.” 

“A million times rather. I want to do some- 
thing with what is in me.” 

“If you had money, you could give it away and 
do good.” 

“ I thought your point was keeping it and using 
it.” 

“ Yes : I think it was.” 

“ Money is in circulation all the time — like the 


130 


SECOND BEST. 


air. It should bless him who gives and him who 
takes.” 

Leila meditated. She did not speak her medi- 
tations, fearing they would tax his thought. It 
was something of a study to her busy brain to 
talk and not provoke thought. As John Oster- 
moor had learned, she certainly did choose unusual 
topics in conversation — for a girl. He would 
rather she would be merrier and not so wise. 

I do not desire money for the sake of handling 
or hoarding; but I love to spend it. I send it 
flying to the four winds ; and I give to the four 
winds as carelessly, papa said. Giving and spend- 
ing are passions with me, and, now I have none to 
give or spend, I am lost.” 

“How about earning?” he asked, thinking of 
his wife, poor little girl, drumming music into a 
slow girl of twelve, and teaching grammar and 
arithmetic ’to the same girl, who hated both. 

“ Oh, dear me ! Don’t suggest that ! I should 
fly to the four winds myself ! I shall have to be 
hungry before I can make myself do that.” 

“ A blessing on the labor of the hands is a bless- 
ing on the brain,” he suggested, touching her 
small weakness concerning her brain. 


SOMEBODY ELSE, 


131 


‘‘ As if I wouldn’t labor with my brain ! ” she 
answered, loftily. Did you think I was speaking 
of working with my hands 

‘‘Are they so useless?” he laughed, provok- 
ingly. 

I wish I knew a girl who had been poor all 
her life, cramped and narrowed, and who cared as 
much as I do for — everything I care for. I would 
like to see what she had done without money and 
what she was made into.” 

“ I can show you that girl.” 

‘‘ Can you ? Do you really know such a girl out- 
side a book ? ” she questioned, eagerly. 

‘‘ I know such a girl. Any day when you will 
walk three miles and a half and back again I will 
show her to you.” 

‘‘ Where does she live ? In a hut ? or under- 
ground.” 

“ Something like three miles from this rock.” 

‘‘ Has she a name as well as a local habitation ? ” 

“Rachel Ennis. She is like her name, if you 
can imagine what that is. I have had glimpses 
of her through my wife. I have never talked with 
her. My wife says she gave her an impetus in a 
new direction, as unconsciously as a flower or bird 


132 


SECOND BEST. 


moves one. She is not stupid, as you may think: 
she is intelligent, perhaps not as intellectual as 
Leila Provost.” 

“I’ve made a failure of that part of me. I do 
not know how to turn it to the betterment of my 
neighbor. My market value is considerably below 
par,” said the intellectual Leila Provost. 

“ She has more real life than you have. She 
lives within a wider range of interests. Having 
more to live for, she has more to live with. Neces- 
sity has been her supreme blessing. Her spirit’s 
life has blossomed out of the hard soil of her phys- 
ical necessities.” 

“ How old is she ? ” was the irrelevant question. 

“Young, fresh, fair, rugged, — she is fine from 
the crown of her blonde hair to the tips of her 
coarse shoes. No one ever thought of calling her 
handsome.” 

“ I suppose she has had the comforts of life.” 

“ Country people usually do have. Did you 
ever think what the comforts of life are?” 

“ Luxuries are the comforts of life to me. I am 
bereft of all the comforts of life at this present 
time. My chamber is a barn, my table would do 
for a working-man, my society is ” — 


SOMEBODY ELSE, 


133 


‘‘ Your chamber and your table would be luxury 
to her. As for society, — she has the best of all 
the ages.” 

Leila arose, with an impatient gesture, as she 
heard John Ostermoor’s shout on the rocks behind 
her. Her companion did not ask her to stay longer. 
He had had an audience of one, as the Lord had 
at the well and in that night talk with Nicodemus. 

The young teacher remembered it and was glad. 
He was on the lookout all day for something to be 
glad about, for something to make Tier glad, — that 
little girl, toiling over the sea for his dear sake. 

Had Leila known what direction to take, she 
would have started off on an exploring expedition 
to discover this Rachel Ennis, who had all the com- 
forts of life and the best society. She pictured her 
deep in the pine woods, with her skirt pinned up, 
her sleeves rolled above the elbow, standing at the 
wash-tub, and then sitting down to dinner, after 
wiping her parboiled fingers on a coarse towel, to 
eat Indian meal ‘‘ Johnny cake ” and baked beans, 
and read Browning when her work was ended. 
It was not elegant, but Leila’s impatience broke 
into ‘‘Fudge.” 

And then Cornelius Arnold, who had been ad- 


134 


SECOND BEST, 


vised to forget his thoughts in his interest in 
things, was soon down in the cove, digging for 
clams in the black mud, to bait his hooks for the 
fish that he must catch for his lobster pots. 

It was John’s ambition to keep the house sup- 
plied with clams, fish, and lobsters. 

‘‘ Somebody’s coming next week,” announced 
John, gleefully, digging into the black mud with 
his hands, — “my sister Sophie.” 

“ Ah ! ” returned Cornelius, absent-mindedly. 

“ The basket is half full.” 

“I thought you would be glad, after what I 
told you,” John burst out, frowning and flushing. 

“Oh, I am: I am very glad,” was the hearty, 
quick response. “ I was thinking about Nancy 
just then.” 

“What an outlandish name ! Was it her great 
grandmother’s ? ” 

“No: it is only her own — for me. We both 
like it. I §ay, boy, how many more clams do you; 
want?” 

“Enough,” declared John. “Arnold, tell me 
why that girl doesn’t like me.”. 

“ You frighten her, and, then — you don’t eat 

nice,” said Cornelius, in a comically fastidious tone. 


SOMEBODY ELSE. 


135 


John shouldered the broken basket, half filled 
with its black load, and turned to go up the rocks 
to the lawn. It was with effort that he spoke 
naturally. He was very angry with Leila Provost. 

‘‘ My father is off to Europe again. Sophie and 
I are to stay here, — for her sake, — and then I am 
going back to business.” 

‘‘ Good ! ” responded Cornelius Arnold. ‘‘ Some 
things happen almost every year, the French prov- 
erb runs.” 

John wheeled around and faced his companion : 
‘‘ Tell me — when is the moment of danger ? ” 

‘‘ The very moment one stops being careful,” 
said Cornelius, with slow impressiveness. 


VIII. 


UNDER THE PINES. 

I am amazed, methinks, and lose my way, 

Among the thorns and dangers of this world.” 

— Shakspere. 

‘‘You wouldn’t wonder at me, Arnold, if you 
knew the life I led three years. I stopped being 
careful one day, — the day I lost the best thing in 
the world. Does it pay to begin again ? I ques- 
tion. I was proud to be a gentlemen for her sake. 
I’ve been a rougli fellow since. But I do care for 
that little thing to think well of me : it hurts me 
for a woman to be afraid of me.” 

The two were lying at length in the hammocks, 
swung near together under the pines along the 
shore. The day’s fishing was over. In the sum- 
mer darkness, the lights of the city over the bay 
shone steadily. Now and then the revolving light 
flashed out. Half a mile away, a yacht lay at 
anchor, with her light swung from a mast-head. 

“If she were my sister, I’d walk up and down 
under the stars with her, and she’d tell me jail her 


UNDER THE PINES. 


137 


heart, as Sophie used to. I don’t believe she has 
anybody in the world. 

‘‘ Yes, she has, or did have, hosts of friends when 
her fatlier was prosperous ; and they entertained 
with generous and handsome hospitality. There 
is a change. I do not understand it. She is 
poor.” 

‘‘No doubt of it. She has been here three weeks, 
and I don’t believe she has spent three cents out- 
side her board. She gave no reason for not taking 
a trip on the ‘ Alice ’ one day, and I suspect it 
was the fare. And I heard her ask Mrs. Oster- 
moor how much Captain Davis would ask for his 
liorse for an afternoon. She has not been any- 
where outside walking distance, and she looked 
so disappointed when I told her the boarders had 
to take their own way of going to church. The 
one old beast that does duty here is nothing but 
bones and rheumatics ! When Sophie comes, she’ll 
make tilings hum. I can take them both.” 

“ Our little friend is not easily taken,” said Cor- 
nelius, smiling at the thought of her pride and 
reserve. 

“ I wonder where she’s moping now. She 
doesn’t take to the boarders worth a cent,” John 
growled. 


138 


SECOND BEST. 


“ There’s a light in her room. Hasn’t she 
books ? ” 

“ I don’t believe she’s a book-worm,” said John, 
confidently. I never see her with a book. There 
are not two in this house, and I don’t believe she 
brought many. She’s plucky, anyway. Well, you 
just wait till my sister comes ! ” in a tone of joyous 
confidence. 

“ I don’t want Sophie to find me altogether a 
brute,” he ran on, ruefully, “ but I can’t refine up 
in a minute. I suppose my slang outlandish. 
But I was such a dandy among those rough and 
dirty fellows ! But some of them were good work- 
ers and did as they were told. Hospitable, too. I 
spent days at a time among them. Left Hand 
Bull and Crazy Dog were fine fellows. I wasn’t 
so taken with Pumpkin Blossom and Swings his 
Head. I even went to a ball in a mud lodge : it 
was circular, built of sod, and large enough to hold 
three hundred Indians and one white man. The 
band consisted of four men, sitting around a home 
made drum made of buffalo hide. This they beat 
with small sticks, and sang songs which in three 
years of acquaintance with their gibberish are still 
foreign to me. While the band was whooping it 


UNDER THE PINES. 


139 


up with drum and voice, about a hundred and fifty 
braves, who were arrayed in paint, feathers, and 
beads (and you never think of praising me for not 
coming home in their costume), were whooping it 
up in great shape, with their legs, in the centre of 
the lodge. No two were dancing the same step, 
but each appeared to be bent on walking off on his 
ear without really getting there. After an hour I 
courteously begged to be excused, and said, 
‘ Thanks, awfully,’ when pressed to partake of 
stewed dog.” 

Cornelius laughed, and the merry ring would 
have comforted the little girl ” on the other side 
of the sea. 

‘‘ What must I do now to be like you ? It’s aw- 
fully hard work to be conventional. I forget some- 
thing every minute. I suppose that girl doesn’t 
like my pipe, and I’ve got to smoke. I’ve got to 
be trimmed off and smoothed down and twisted 
around. I believe I will write to Sophie not to 
come yet awhile until I’m brushed up a little. I 
don’t want to frighten her, I eat like a savage, 
in hot, hungry haste. I talk too loud, too, don’t 
I ? I say, Arnold, tell a fellow all he’s got to 
change.” 


140 


SECOND BEST. 


The rough appeal was pathetic. Cornelius 
Arnold was as refined and fastidious as a girl, him- 
self. He had determined to speak to John about 
his table manners, or to change his seat to another, 
where he would not be forced to observe him. 

‘‘Go back and be what you were four years 
ago.” 

“ That wasn’t anything : that wasn’t half 
enough. I was rough and loud and impetuous 
then. I was kept in. I have only let myself out. 
I don’t know what to do, and what not to do ; I 
don’t know what is refined and what isn’t ; I don’t 
know what is selfish and what isn’t. I want some- 
thing better than a refined and polished outside. 
I want the inside of me to be different. I can’t 
tell you how that girl touches me. She makes me 
want to behave my best self more than even my 
sister ever did. She petted me ; but this girl lifts 
me up. She makes me sure there is something in 
me to be lifted up, and I’m beat if I know how she 
does it. Plain little thing ! ” he said, affectionately. 
“I shall never fall in love with a homely girl. 
But I’d stand on my head or chew tenpenny nails 
to make her think well of me. I’ll have to put 
myself under my own feet to do it, and grind my 
teeth together. Can’t you tell me how ? ” 


UNDER THE PINES. 


141 


‘‘No,” said Cornelius. “ You’ll have to do it 
after your own fashion. Even the way to do it 
must come out of the inside of yourself.” 

“ I thought experiences didn’t come to people 
until they were old,” said John, reproaching some- 
body. 

“ Why not ?” asked Cornelius, with a sharp 
intonation. 

“ Oh, because I thought it took a fellow so long 
to get old. I am just awake to thinking that I am 
a man, and not a boy. I believe I was born 
younger than most masculines, and I’ve had to 
feel a great deal before I could think at all. I’ve 
had to be hurt and bruised and bled before some- 
thing in me could be reached : it may not be much 
of anything now, but it is all there is. I have all 
along been too much for myself, — a jungle choked 
with rank growth. Can’t you tell me anything ? ” 

“ No. Find out for yourself. What do you 
read?” 

“ Nothing. I am not a reader. I got through 
college somehow, by working hard the last year. 
All I cared for was the fun.” 

“Do you read the New Testament ? ” 

“ Once in a while.” 


142 


SECOND BEST. 


Have you read the Gospels through? ” 

Not half. I can’t understand.'” 

‘‘ What reason had you for thinking yourself a 
Christian? ” 

“ I was a boy, then. I believe I was on the 
right track. I loved God. I loved to pray, — if 
saying anything you like to God is praying. I 
couldn’t make much out of the Bible, but I liked 
a rousing good sermon. I’ve lost the trail, and 
got off. It seems to me a mighty easy thing to 
get off. What shall I do to get back ? ” he asked, 
with remorseful earnestness. 

“ Go back.” 

‘G don’t know how.” 

Are you back with your father again?” 

After his fashion — yes.” 

“ Go back to God after His fashion.” 

There’s a difference in the fashions,” remarked 
John, dryly. 

“ ‘ If ye, then, being evil,’ Christ said of earthly 
fathers. He doesn’t call them compassionate, for- 
giving, sympathetic ” — 

“ Oh, I didn’t expect much. I knew better.” 

‘‘What do you expect of God?” was the start- 
ling question. 


UNDER THE PINES, 


143 


Througli the darkness the questioner did not see 
the flash in the eyes that were looking up toward 
the stars, nor the soft tears that fllled them for an 
instant. 

“ I expect everything was the half-smothered 
reply. ' ‘‘ I am as weak as a rag. You cannot un- 
derstand such weakness. A child’s Anger lifted in 
ridicule would turn me aside from doing a good 
thing. A look in a man’s eye or a tone in his 
voice would shake a good resolution out of me. 
The mercury in a thermometer is not as sensitive 
as I am to the atmosphere of a room. I rise and 
fall with the breath of everything about me.” 

John ended with a sob. 

God’s strength is made perfect in a very queer 
workshop.” 

‘‘Where? What kind?” 

“In weakness — like yours.” 

John snatched a twig off a branch above his 
head and put it between his lips. God’s strength 
was too mighty and far off for him to touch it, — 
farther off, he thought, peering up over the tree- 
tops, than those stars twinkling up there in the 
dark. 

“I say, Arnold,” the words came out with a 


144 


SECOND BEST. 


jerk, ‘‘I don’t understand about praying. You 
might think if God cared He would give you 
things — anyway.” 

“ Paul prayed for very natural things, things 
you might have thought God would give him — 
anyway: for instance, that his service might be 
accepted of the saints. God had given him the 
service, and he might have known He wouldn’t 
let it fail.” 

Then why wasn’t it a waste of words to pray 
about it? Why didn’t he pray about something 
he wasn’t so sure about?” 

Cornelius laughed. You are very natural. 
True enough : why didn’t he ? ” 

“ Do you know? ” 

Yes.” 

“It doesn’t strike me as reasonable, or having 
faith, as you would call it.” 

“ Another apostle tells us that when we ask any- 
thing according to Grod's wilG He hears us. When 
we are assured He is Avilling to give a certain 
thing, then is the time to ask. Even Christ 
prayed for what he knew God was sure to give. 
Did you think prayer was availing to get what 
God is not willing to give ? ” 


UNDER THE PINES. 


145 


‘‘Hardly. I would not like to ask for that. 
But I did think that was its only practical value.” 

“ And not being willing to ask for what you are 
sure about and for what you are not sure about, — 
between the two states of mind you would ask not 
at all.” 

“ You have stated it : I believe I am just there.” 

‘‘ It’s a queer mixture of faith, ignorance, care- 
lessness, and unbelief.” 

“ That’s what I am, — a queer mixture. I’m 
glad there’s a bit of faith in it. What shall I 
do about it?” 

‘‘ Why not stay where you are ? ” 

John pondered. All he knew was that he was 
not satisfied to stay where he was. 

‘‘ You know about that prodigal fellow, — he got 
tired of husks and wickedness. He had been in 
his father’s house, and he knew what was better 
than husks. So do I. There’s something in a 
night like this that goes to the bottom of you. I 
feel as if I had been turned inside out, and the 
Lord had seen all through me. Now I want to be 
set on my feet and made to walk upright, like a 
man. I hope this doesn’t sound like nonsense to 
you.” 


146 


SECOND BEST. 


It’s the best common sense a man can talk, 
dear old fellow. Sin is the greatest non-sense a 
fool can commit.” 

‘‘Well, I feel better, anyway,” said John, tum- 
bling headlong out of his hammock. “ I don’t 
believe that girl likes me to smoke, and if it 
weren’t such a tug I’d quit. Say, shall I try 
giving it up for a month ? ” 

“ As you think best,” was the cool answer. 

“Why, don’t careV'" asked John, amazed, 
bringing himself upright. 

“ Don’t do anything because I care, or because 
that girl cares : do the right thing for the strong- 
est, safest, sweetest reason in the universe of 
God.” 

John strode away in the darkness. Then a 
thought came to him with such force that he 
turned and went back to Cornelius. 

“ If God will do His will anyway, and I want 
Him to do it anyway, why should I say anything 
to Him about what I want? ” 

“ Because you love to, and can’t be happy with- 
out it, as you love to talk about what you care 
most for to the person you love best. You can’t 
help that : it talks itself. So praying should pray 


UNDER THE PINES. 


147 


itself. It should be as natural as a cliikrs laugh, 
or a mourner’s sigh, or a lover’s happiness, or the 
quick beating of your heart when you are glad.” 

What makes a thing according to God’s Avill ? ” 
John questioned, impatiently. 

^’‘You do — some of it.” 

John breathed a long, low whistle of astonish- 
ment. Cornelius gave a spring out of his ham- 
mock, and they walked together toward the 
house. 

When Garibaldi wanted men, he sent out his 
proclamation : ‘Men of Italy, I offer you cold, 
hunger, rags, and death. Whosoever loves his 
country, let him follow me.’ And soldiers who 
had grit enough followed him.” 

“ That was glorious ! ” exclaimed John. “ That’s 
the stuff for a soldier to be made of ! ” 

“ It does seem odd, but it was Timothy, with his 
often infirmities, whom Paul, that old soldier of 
the cross, commanded to endure hardness as a good 
soldier of Jesus Christ.” 

“ I like that ! ” John said, enthusiastically. “ I 
want something to fight. I can’t be one of the 
sit-still-and-meditate Christians. I want to bang 
about all that life is worth. I want to fight a good 


148 


SECOND BEST, 


fight; I want to tussle with the world, the flesh, 
and the devil.” 

“ You are in trim for it,” was the quiet answer. 
“ A fellow that can’t give up smoking when he 
wishes he could, — the world, the flesh, and the 
devil may as well skulk away before such prowess.” 

John laughed, but he was provoked. A retort 
leaped to his lips and was choked back. 

“Weren’t you ever a slave to a habit? ” 

“ I was a slave bound hand and foot.” 

“ How did you get free ? ” 

“ I was made free, — purchased, and set free ” — 

“ That’s all Greek to me.” 

“ It was all foolishness to the Greeks. There 
are some things we have to know in ourselves. If 
I should talk till my breath failed, I couldn’t make 
you understand. You may read the Bible from 
beginning to end, and be as deep in the dark as 
when you began. John Ostermoor, you are dead, 
and no one can quicken you with life but God, the 
Holy Spirit. The world is full of the dead. You 
can fight the world, the flesh, and the devil as 
bravely and victoriously as any other dead man.” 

“Don’t you see any sign of life in me?” John 
asked. 


UNDER THE PINES. 


149 


“ I see a movement now and then that I hope is 
a sign of eternal life ; but how do I know ? Even 
the young ruler, who had kept all the command- 
ments from his youth up, who kneeled before the 
T^ord, and saw his face, and heard his call, got up 
on his feet and went away. He went back to the 
world, the flesh, and the devil from the very feet 
of Christ. It is not the beginning, but the keep- 
ing on and holding on to the end, that proves the 
eternal life in a man. The first cry of the infant 
proves life, but it doesn’t prove that he will live.” 

They had come to the bars in the stone wall that 
separated the lawn from the field : John pulled out 
the bars, Cornelius stepped over. 

Arnold, I wish you would tell me the way as 
plain as you can tell me the way to Portland.” 

“ I can. As the Bishop of Lonsdale put it, ‘ Turn 
to the right, and go straight forward.’ ” 


IX. 


IN HER CHAMBER. 

“ He that will have a cake out of the wheat 
Must tarry the grinding.” 

— Shakspere. 

While the twilight was deepening into night, 
and Rachel Ennis was sprinkling the clothes to be 
ironed, and John Ostermoor and Cornelius Arnold 
were talking under the pines, Leila Provost saun- 
tered in from a solitary walk on the edge of the 
pine woods, and went up to her “ barn ” of a cham- 
ber, about as desolate and discouraged as she had 
ever been in her life. 

She could not endure this pretence at existence 
another day longer. Was she not dwarfed and 
starved and cramped, besides being utterly misera- 
ble? 

Her father’s plan had failed : it had failed 
through her own selfishness and inefficiency, no 
doubt. Still it was a failure, and he would not 
blame her if he knew. People up in heaven were 
so patient and pitiful, — how could she breathe the 


IN HER CHAMBER. 


151 


breath of life with everything taken that she lived 
for, and nothing new poured in ! If she had some- 
thing real to be miserable about, that would make 
life worth living. Who in the world, the world at 
Ostermoor Point, where her father wished her to 
stay, cared whether she awoke in the morning or 
were found dead in her bed? She was not sure 
that she cared herself. It would be very sweet to 
lie down and sleep and awake in heaven ; that 
would give her a motive for putting her head on 
her pillow. Now, she did not care whether she 
went to bed or sat up all night. If she went to 
sleep, it would be to awake at Ostermoor Point, 
and she did not wish to awake at Ostermoor Point. 

Perhaps her father was not accountable ” in 
those last days ; and then she had not promised. 
She would not be breaking a promise if she went 
home to-morrow, drew her monthly allowance, and 
did any wild thing she could think of. 

And she would! She would start off alone and 
go to Aunt Wesie, — she was on the coast of Eng- 
land somewhere, — and she would stay in Rome 
with her, or in Germany, and study this winter. 
She would do everything she loved to do, and not 
one thing she did not love to do. She was not 


152 


SECOND BEST, 


brave or true, and she did not care to be ‘‘ wider,” 
or find another side to herself, — there was not any 
other side to her. She wanted to be narrow and 
selfish and happy. 

Her father might be very sorry, but he would 
not be disappointed ; and God did not care, — she 
had not once thought of turning herself around 
because He cared. She had tried to please Him in 
doing things she liked, and she had tried hard not 
to do things that He did not like. She was not 
bound in any way : she was free this minute. In 
her joy and relief she hugged herself and laughed 
aloud. She knew where Aunt Wesie was : she 
could go straight to her across land and sea. 

There was no use in trying to shake this mood 
off: it would come again, and life would be all 
the more dreadful to-morrow because she had 
thought of freedom. Was it a temptation? 
Should she struggle against it ? Should she pray 
for strength to resist? Should she light that 
horrid little kerosene lamp and get something to 
read? 

But was not youth the time for times ? 
When could she have hope and love and money 
and travel and pictures and study and ease, if not 


IN HER CHAMBER. 


158 


now? It was wicked to make youth hard and 
gloomy and dry and desolate. And yet — where 
did the thought come from ? — it was to the young 
ruler Christ spoke, and bade him give up all he 
cared for, and follow him. 

I might as well give up and die, then ! ” she 
cried, passionately. “I told papa I could not 
live without my money.” If God should take her 
money away, that would be different. But He did 
not take the young ruler’s money away. 

He gave it to me,” she cried, aloud, dropping 
her head on her knees as she sat on a low chair at 
the window. “ He wants me to use it.” 

And was not that what she was at Ostermoor 
Point learning to do ? 

But she was not learning: she was growing 
harder and more stupid every day. Perhaps she 
might learn if she could know that girl, Rachel 
Ennis. 

But Rachel was not learning : she had no money 
to use. 

And that was not her father’s design. His plan 
was that she might learn to use herself. It was 
weak, but she sighed and wept. She wished she 
were a little girl again, and that she was weeping 


154 


SECOND BEST. 


with her head on her father’s knee. To-morrow 
would have to come, and she must decide. If the 
rich man must be as though he were a poor man, 
what was the good of being born rich ? She almost 
wished Christ had not come to earth a poor man, 
tliat he might teach men how to live a poor man’s 
life. Blessed are ye poor.” Did he not say any- 
where, Blessed are ye rich ” ? 

Her Bible was on the bureau: it was the only 
book she dared put into her trunk. Every other 
book she owned was a treasure, and she must find 
new treasures, and not dig in her old mines. She 
thought it Avas like a funeral that day she packed 
her books away : they were buried, they must be 
dead and buried for three years, — her poets, her 
story-tellers, her works on moral and mental philos- 
ophy and physiology, all the precious old biogra- 
phies, and the volumes of essays she knew by 
heart, all her Bible helps, — for it Avould be some- 
thing new to study the Bible by herself, and she 
must do everything she had never done before. 

Because she could not read Avhat she would, in 
these months since her father died, she had read 
nothing at all, — nothing excepting the Bible and 
the daily papers. She used to ‘Vhate ” the daily 


IN HER CHAMBER, 


155 


papers : therefore it fell out that she was thrown 
upon the Bible and had learned more from it than 
in all her years of study. What she learned she 
found out for herself. 

She opened the Bible with the hope of finding a 
blessing on the rich, a blessing simply and only in 
being rich. If if were a blessing, Christ must have 
said something about it : he cared for what his 
Father had made blessed. 

I will see what the blessings are,” she said, 
speaking aloud for the sake of the companionship 
of her own voice. 

She found them, — seven blessings : not one was 
for the rich, and one ioa% for the poor : Blessed are 
the poor. 

But that was not all. He was speaking to his 
disciples as in that other time when he said, 
‘^Blessed are ye poor”; but this time he added 
something to explain it : it was, “ Blessed are the 
poor,” — not any poor, not the rebellious poor, the 
haughty, self-seeking poor, the poor that were 
making haste to be rich, the poor that were finding 
fault with God because of their poverty, the poor 
to whom the cares of this world were a weight and 
a drawback, but the poor in spirit. This was the 


156 


SECOND BEST, 


rich man’s poverty, — poor in spirit. This was 
the poverty her father was seeking for her. This 
was the poverty God made blessed by giving in 
return the kingdom of heaven. 

Giving all her goods to feed the poor and her 
body to be burned would not earn this poorness of 
spirit, — humility, emptiness of self, dependence 
upon God. 

She remembered something in Revelation about 
being rich, or some one thinking he was rich. It 
was several minutes before she found it. She read 
it aloud : “ Because thou sayest, I am rich, and 
increased with goods, and have need of nothing, 
and knowest not that thou art wretched and mis- 
erable and poor [he said he was rich and did not 
know he was poor] and blind and naked [that is a 
description of a rich man, — wretched, miserable, 
poor, blind, naked], I counsel thee to buy of me/' 
gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich.” ^ 

She had found it . Christ counselled her to buy 
of him gold tried in the fire, and then she would 
be rich, and then he could say to her : Blessed are 
ye rich. His gold must be tried in the fire. Her 
gold had not been tried in the fire. She closed the 
book, and, lifting it in both hands, rested her cheek 


IN HER CHAMBER, 


157 


against it. She would stay awhile longer and 
think and read about it in this place where there 
was nothing to disturb. She would give all her 
gold for this tried gold; but all her gold would 
not buy it. 

It was to be had “ without money.’ ^ 

The tears were dried on her cheeks, her lips 
gathered firmness and sweetness. She was as near 
to Christ here as anywhere in his world. With 
the Bible in her hand, she paced up and down the 
long room. If the sun were shining, she would 
run out on the rocks ; but it was lonely in the 
dark, and the road, bordered on both sides with the 
woods, was even lonelier. Too restless to be quiet, 
she walked up and down, with a light, even tread. 
She would stay another week, she would stay 
until she had the gold tried in the fire, and then 
go out in the world and spend it. Surely, that 
gold must not be hoarded. And, if she had that 
tried gold, her own riches would have no power 
over her to keep her out of the kingdom promised 
to the poor in spirit. 

And, then, another wave swept over her, — a 
wave of naturalness. If she should do as her 
father willed, would she not be taking out of her 


158 


SECOND BEST, 


life three of her best years, her best young years ? 
Keeping herself hidden and poor and plain, might 
she not lose what was given to girls in their attract- 
ive young times ? All she had to be attractive 
with was her youth, and what she could make of 
herself with her opportunities. With these rusty 
three years to grow older in, would anybody find 
her lovely enough to love ? It was only human 
and natural, and not wicked one bit ; but she was 
ashamed of herself, with no eye to see the hot 
shame in her face. Her father might have known 
and remembered that he had left her solitary, and 
that the woman’s heart in her was crying out for 
companionship, and that nobody could love her 
unless she made herself lovely. She told herself 
frankly that she had left no one out in her world 
that she could be happier with, or grow with ; but 
there might be somebody somewhere that God 
knew about, and, perhaps, she was taking herself 
out of God’s hands into her own moulding and 
shaping by running away from the world He had 
put her into, and making a world of her own, with 
his blessing of gold left out. 

Under the inspiration of her grief for her 
father’s death, and stirred into something higher 


IN HER CHAMBER, 


159 


than herself by the stimulus of doing the one thing 
he desired her to do, it had not been hard, but 
rather exciting, to leave the home that was not 
home without him, and to say to the friends that 
crowded around her that she had planned a year of 
solitude. She had taken a solemn satisfaction in 
packing away nineteen beautiful dresses and or- 
dering three of plain material, in leaving behind 
fine perfumery, handsome letter paper, dainty 
pocket-handkerchiefs, and every other pretty thing 
her taste in dress revelled in, and in filling a small 
trunk with cheap underwear and the barest neces- 
sities of a lady’s wardrobe. Her trunk might be 
the property of any serving maid, — any serving 
maid Avho saved her earnings and had no love of 
finery. She could not feel that it belonged to her. 
She wrote her name upon a tag and fastened it on, 
thinking it was that other Leila Provost and not 
her real self who would unlock it at Ostermoor 
Point. 

In the solitude, and with the hunger for her old 
life gnawing at her heart, the excitement had died 
its lingering death, the stimulus had spent its force, 
her natural self had arisen in arms and conquered. 

No common loaf would be moulded out of her- 
self, for she could not tarry the grinding. 


160 


SECOND BEST. 


The salt air was not chilly to-night. The three 
windows of her chamber were open: the two at 
the end of the room gave her a view of the water 
and Cousin’s Island, the one at the side, and very 
near the corner, looked down the road as well as 
toward the bay. This window was one of her con- 
solations at night, for the steady lights of the city 
burned, and the lights of the light-house flashed in 
and out. Above this window was the garret win- 
dow that her father had looked out of when he 
was a boy. The road began under this window in 
front of the old house. A few rods farther on, on 
the opposite side, was the only house in sight, a 
long, low, white house, where old Captain Davis 
farmed and his wife took summer boarders. 

Within a stone’s throw from the window stood 
the house, one-storied, unpainted, which John 
Ostermoor’s great-grandfather built. In the large 
room in the centre, now used as a carriage house, 
was the fireplace in which the old man, then 
not such an old man, had made the ball cartridges 
he used as lieutenant on board the small vessel he 
had owned and sold to the government. Her 
father had been proud of him, and kept as a 
curiosity the brown paper parcel his grandmother 


IN HER CHAMBER, 


161 


had given him. There was a crack in it, and some 
of the gunpowder had oozed out. It was the only 
tangible evidence Leila had to prove to herself that 
in her veins was the blood of the homespun Oster- 
moors. In the garret, Mrs. Ostermoor told her, 
was a painted copy of the original family coat-of- 
arms, and somewhere about was a militaiy commis- 
sion, signed, by his own hand, G. Washington.” 

But she was not any part of this long-ago life. 
Her mother’s name was Evans, her father’s, 
Provost. The Ostermoor great-grandmother had 
sent nothing down through the years to her. She 
had a right to break any imaginary tie and choose 
her own life and be her own self. She had not 
told John Ostermoor that the Allethre Ostermoor 
whose name was cut on a stone in the graveyard 
next to the Indian burying-ground was her an- 
cestor as well as his : he might claim kinship, and 
make uncomfortable demand upon the cousinhood 
that she was not at all prepared to acknowledge or 
to be proud of ; she was reserved and proud, and 
she was proud of being both. 

She stood at the window, looking down at the 
old house. Her great-grandmother had been a girl 
in that house, knitted and woven and spun and 


162 


SECOND BEST, 


churned and baked, rowed over to Cousin’s Island, 
and gone to church in an ox-cart, and read the 
Bible through every year, as people did in old 
times, when there were not so many books to read. 
That was one side of her. Would she have been 
wider could she have turned about and made an- 
other side? Perhaps she did after she was mar- 
ried, — why, she Avas named for her ! She had for- 
gotten that her second queer name had any signifi- 
cance, — Leila Allethre. 

John Ostermoor was whistling softly under her 
windows. Cornelius Arnold had come up the un- 
carpeted stairs to his chamber opposite her own. 
In the small sitting-room doAvnstairs a child was 
crying, two or three girls were laughing, one or 
two gentlemen were smoking, and two old ladies 
were talking Avith the Montreal people that had 
come over from Captain Davis’s. The other 
boarders Avere in their OAvn rooms. There would 
be twenty-one at the long breakfast table the next 
morning. 

With the zest of definite purpose, Leila turned 
from the windoAv and stood before the bureau in 
the corner betAveen the Avindows, to take down her 
long hair for the night. 


IN HER CHAMBER. 


163 


The salt air, the bathing, the homely food, and 
early hours for bedtime were working well in her 
face. There were color and roundness that she 
had not brought with her. She thought she would 
like to stay and grow prettier. 

In the morning she awoke with a great deal to 
do: she thought she had never had so much to do 
in her life. Her start was in the direction of the 
kitchen. 


X. 


RACHEL ENNIS. 

As cloth is tinged of any dye 
In which it long time plunged may lie, 

So those with whom he loves to live 
To every man his color give.” 

— Hindu Proverb. 

She passed through the sitting-room, glailcing 
around at the signs of last night’s disorder, and 
thinking she would like to take away with her one 
of the blue and white china fireplace tiles for a 
piece of Iric-d-hrae to adorn her own room at home, 
and stepped into the dining-room. It was very 
early: the long table was not set for breakfast, ex- 
cepting with the five small plates down the centre 
piled with fresh doughnuts. They were tempting, 
and she took one from the plate nearest her, and 
stood munching it. At first it had displeased her 
to see them on the breakfast table ; but now, like 
the other boarders, she took one with her coffee. 

A door suddenly opened, a smooth, black head 
appeared. ‘‘ O Miss Provost ! That’s right ! I 
was wondering if Josie had set the table. Help 


RACHEL ENNIS. 


165 


yourself ; I didn’t get through the last lot till 
eleven last night.” 

The black head and pleasant face disappeared. 
It was seven: the breakfast bell would ring at 
quarter past eight. She expected to walk two 
miles before breakfast, and needed another dough- 
nut to keep the air and exercise from making her 
too hungry. With the other doughnut in her fin- 
gers, she followed the black head into the kitchen. 

‘‘You are not a bit of a Yankee, but you like my 
doughnuts,” laughed Mrs. Ostermoor. 

“ And your beans and brown bread ! I never 
felt so hungry in my life as I do this morning, or 
so strong and ready for anything. I awoke this 
morning feeling as if I had grown strong in my 
sleep.” 

“You look so! You looked puny and pale 
when you came. I shouldn’t wonder if you had 
gained fifteen pounds. Mrs. Hayley has gained 
eighteen in four weeks.” 

On the square table in the centre of the room, 
covered with dark oil-cloth, was placed the break- 
fast for the family, — a large plate piled with 
doughnuts, half of a huge mince pie, slices of cold 
fried ham, and broken pieces of rolls and corn 


166 


SECOND BEST, 


bread, evidently left from the boarders’ table. In 
the big tin coffee-pot was the coffee boiled over, 
also a remnant of the boarders’ table. 

“ Do have a cup of coffee with your doughnut,” 
urged the hospitable landlady: “it looks dry.” 

“ Thank you,” accepted Leila, laughing. “ Don’t 
get another cup. Give me one of these. I’ll 
stand here and take it.” 

“You never make one bit of trouble,” was the 
admiring answer, as Mrs. Ostermoor poured the 
coffee into the large, coarse crockery. “ I would 
like to have twenty girls like you all summer long. 
But one more u coming, and, for the life of me, I 
can’t think where to put her. Miss Ostermoor, 
Mr. John Ostermoor’s sister. Do you know her? ” 

“ Thank you,” said Leila, taking the cup. “ No : 
I never saw her.” 

“You wouldn’t relish having another bed put 
in your room, I suppose,” Mrs. Ostermoor ven- 
tured. “Your room is the biggest one in the 
house. Last summer four people slept in it, and 
brought in twenty dollars a week.” 

Leila sipped the hot coffee : with the rich cream 
it was delicious. 

“ And now it brings you but five. Mrs. Oster- 


RACHEL ENNIS. 


167 


moor, I came downstairs to ask you to release me 
from my engagement, expecting to pay you for 
the rest of the time.” 

Why, you are not going away ! ” cried Mrs. 
Ostermoor, turning from the sink, with disappoint- 
ment written in every line of her face. ‘‘I like 
you ; and you are growing so well, and have such 
a nice color in your cheeks ! It is the making of 
you here, — Mr. Arnold says so, — and I can make 
somebody else double up, if that’s the reason.” 

‘‘ That is not the reason. I did not know Miss 
Ostermoor was coming. I did not think of going 
this week. I am perfectly willing to have another 
bedstead put into my room for the few days I re- 
main. I am in a state of indecision. Everything 
this morning bewitches me to stay. If I go, I will 
not break my engagement with you ; rest assured 
of that. You shall have five dollars every week 
until the first day of September.” 

“ I hope you do not think for a minute that I 
would take it. People’s plans have to change. 
Are you sent for ? ” 

‘‘No: I had other plans.” 

“ I wouldn’t take money from you, I have lots 
of sympathy with people as poor and hard-working 
as I am. This is your vacation, I suppose.” 


168 


SECOND BEST. 


It was comical. Leila laughed as she set her 
cup and saucer on the table. What did the good 
woman suppose she worked at to earn her living ? 

Hastening to speak, thinking she had made 
some kind of a mistake, Mrs. Ostermoor said: 

I hope to have more slee23ing room next summer. 
You know about the French Spoliation, of course. 
Well, if we get our money, I shall put it all on 
the house. Boarders like a piazza. I shall have 
a piazza and paint the house and put on blinds. 
Old grandfather didn’t think of these things in 
his day. He left seven heirs, and they were all 
married but one, and they all left heirs, and his 
share in the vessel the French got was not more 
than four thousand. So you see the Ostermoors 
won’t be made rich in a hurry. We don’t count 
on it; but we like to play what we will do with it. 
Cousin Horace says he will take his share to give 
old grandfather another gravestone. What would 
you do with it ? Congress is slow about it, and I 
don’t suppose will pay interest, and we’ve got to 
pay our lawyer twenty per cent. So, counting all 
the heirs, Ave shan’t have more than a hundred 
dollars apiece. Old grandfather left each of his 
grandchildren a hundred dollars apiece in his will, 


RACHEL ENNIS. 


169 


but this hundred his great-grandchildren and great 
great will get, if Congress ever hurries up. Per- 
haps my grandchildren will get it.” She laughed 
goodhuinoredly, stepping to the stove to stir the 
oatmeal. ‘‘ Did you ever make an air castle of 
what you would do if you had a hundred dollars? ” 

“ No,” said Leila, seriously, “ I never did.” 

‘‘ I suppose it silly ; but, when I pay all my 
bills, I like to think of what I’d like to do if I 
have any left. Rachel comes over once in a while, 
and when I tell she says. Beware, and don’t 
get discontented. I believe she thinks discon- 
tented is as wicked as swearing. They used to be 
better off. Her father was a doctor and had a splen- 
did practice ; but he lost his eyesight : one eye was 
gone and the other went. I should think a doctor 
could have kept his eyesight in, shouldn’t you? 
They own the place, about twenty acres, and that 
girl has ploughed this summer like a man, and 
made her own garden, and, with chickens and 
a cow, and the little interest he gets on what he 
had saved, they manage. But the place goes 
down every year, and everything gets shabbier 
and shabbier ; but he can’t see it, and that makes 
Rachel happy. She painted the blinds herself; 


170 


SECOND BEST. 


but she couldn’t afford the paint for the whole 
house. It’s a big house. Her grandmother is a 
caution, and Delia is flighty, and Mint is a queer 
specimen, and her father is melancholy. He never 
goes to church, and that breaks her heart ; but she 
is like a grasshopper, always going, and the will- 
ingest girl that ever drew breath.” 

The children came tramping down the kitchen 
stairway, barefooted, with rumpled hair, and fun 
in their faces. Their father came to the door with 
brimming milk-pails. Without asking, as she 
wished to do, where Rachel Ennis lived, Leila 
made her escape through the door that opened into 
the dining-room ; Josie was setting the breakfast 
table, and Susan, another farmer’s daughter, was 
sweeping the sitting-room. 

They were both named Ostermoor. Lelia won- 
dered how many cousins she could count if she 
should announce herself an Ostermoor, and if she, 
being an Ostermoor, were one of the heirs of the 
French Spoliation. If she were, what would she 
do with her hundred dollars? She wished the 
French Spoliation meant something to the girl who 
ploughed and made a garden like a man. 

Oh, good morning.” 


RACHEL ENNIS. 


171 


It was John Ostermoor in the doorway of the 
small front entry. For a wonder that hateful clay 
pipe was not between his lips. 

“ I congratulate you,” she said, mockingly. 

‘‘ Upon a clean face, or what ? ” 

On the absence of your pipe.” 

I knew you didn’t like it. Girls don’t. They 
say Tennyson smokes a long clay.” 

I suppose if he had a boil on his nose you 
would rub the end of yours to make it red. Why 
don’t you do some manly thing that he does ?” 

‘‘ Don’t you remember the noted man whom his 
friend found smoking and remarked, ‘ At your idol 
again,’ and he answered, Wes, burning it’ ? Don’t 
you like to see me burn mine? Do you prefer 
cigars? ” 

“ I don’t prefer smoking, anyway.” 

He stepped down the one step to the flat stone. 
She stood in the doorway looking off to the green 
slope of Cousin’s Island. 

‘‘Why not?” 

“ Oh, I don’t know all the reasons. I should 
think a young man would care to keep his breath 
and blood pure, as pure as a girl’s. And think of 
puffing away dollars in the course of a year that 
somebody is agonizing to get.” 


172 


SECOND BEST. 


“ Oh, smoking don’t cost so much. I never puff 
away more than a hundred dollars a year, even 
when I smoke cigars.” 

Do you know Rachel Ennis ? ” 

“No. Who is she ? ” 

“ If she had what you puff away” — 

“I can’t retort what you spend in candy and 
perfumery, can I ? ” 

“ And gloves. I love fresh gloves. I shall not 
go home until I see her.” 

“ I could retort that with Sophie. Flowers and 
perfumery and boxes of fine candy and choice 
restaurant lunches. Did I tell you she is coming ? 
She isn’t like me. You will like her.” 

“She is to share my room. Mrs. Ostermoor 
told me. But I may not stay longer than Satur- 
day.” 

“ To-day is Tuesday,” replied John, in visible 
disappointment. 

Couldn’t she afford to stay longer ? And her 
cheeks were growing pink and round. Must she 
go back to her work again ? He could not fix 
that : even Sophie could not fix that. 

“ I say,” he burst out, “ I don’t like that.” 

“ Oh, I may change my mind, — if I like your 
sister, and find Rachel Ennis.” 


RACHEL ENNIS. 


173 


“ I’ll find Rachel Ennis if I have to circumnavi- 
gate the globe ! And there’s no doubt about 
Sophie,” he answered, convincingly. 

‘‘ Thank you,” she said, with a new shyness. 

Don’t go through the grass. Have you rub- 
bers on? You should have rubber boots, the way 
you tramp.” 

‘‘ I’m going on the rocks now. After breakfast 
I’m going through the sheep pasture and to the 
clam dock.” 

‘‘It’s hard on a fellow that you never will let 
him go with you,” he said, inclined to be pro- 
voked. 

“ You don’t know how hard it might be ‘ on a 
fellow ’ to go with me,” she said, mockingly, dart- 
ing off. 

“ Will you allow me to shoulder the responsi- 
bility ? ” he called after her. 

She stopped and turned her mischievous face 
toward him: “Not even to your broad shoulders 
would I dare to shift my own responsibility.” 

“ I wish I could get underneath that,” he mut- 
tered, as he watched her standing on a rock. “I 
don’t believe she knows why she doesn’t like me.” 

Leila did not watch for the mail as every other 


174 


SECOND BEST, 


boarder at Ostermoor Point did, morning and 
night, when the rheumatic old horse returned 
from the village, and the small Frank unbundled 
himself of letters, papers, and packages. In the 
mail this morning was a letter directed to Mrs. 
Frank Ostermoor that decided a doubtful question 
for Leila, — the question whether or not to stay 
longer at Ostermoor Point. 

In the sheep pasture after breakfast, sitting on 
the grass, and leaning back against the trunk of 
an apple-tree, with something she did not like in 
her hand, she had decided to go, and then decided 
to stay, then had reversed the decisions, and, with 
a determination that stiffened every muscle in her 
determined little body, she had said to herself, I 
stay and brave it through.” 

She was ashamed of the last grain that weighed 
the balance down. It was not the thought of her 
father, it was not that it was a right thing to choose, 
it was not that she might make a stronger woman 
of herself : it was silly and selfish and vain and 
natural ; it was the vision of a face, a sun-browned 
face, with a crown of light curling hair, and se- 
rious eyes, when they were not fun-loving, and a 
voice that held you sometimes, as something was 


RACHEL EJVmS. 


175 


holding her at this instant. She was ashamed, 
so ashamed and angry that her eyes filled, and she 
would have liked to give herself a blow. She 
threw out her hands with an indignant motion, 
then drop23ed them passively into her lap. She 
had yielded, and she knew she had yielded. Now 
the only thing that remained to her to do was to 
keep him back. . Her reserve and pride were equal 
to that : they were equal to anything. She could 
never look herself in the face again ; but there 
was a refuge from herself, — the flight to Aunt 
Wesie, or the doing all those things she did not 
like to do. 

The first thing was the book in her hand, — a 
work on geology. She remembered that she had 
pushed it in among her dresses, because her 
father’s name was written in it, and geology was 
a subject that had never attracted her, out of 
school, to an hour’s reading. 

If she resolved to read it through, she must 
keep her word. She might as well have some- 
thing gritty to grind her teeth on. She had got 
to get pluck somewhere, — to go or stay. She 
would look it through first. Opetiing at random, 
her eye was arrested : — 


176 


SECOND BEST. 


‘‘ Without volcanoes and earthquakes it is more 
than probable our little planet would not have 
lived out half its days. Every shock and out- 
burst, therefore, means a new lease of life to the 
earth.” 

She gave the book a toss into the grass, and 
leaned back, clasping her fingers above her bare 
head. She had had her shock and outburst : was 
there, therefore, a new lease of life to her ? 

There was a current of more rapid life pulsing 
through every artery, steadying nerve and brain. 
She knew she would stand more firmly upon her 
feet Avhen she arose. She had braced herself to 
endure: a part of the endurance was the shame 
of herself. 

She revelled in the shock and the outburst. 
The new self they had awakened in her was some- 
body more worth her knowing. The earth under 
her feet was a different thing from yesterday. 

As her eyes roved over the green pasture, with 
its broad, flat rocks spread out everywhere, they 
settled at last upon a huge stone, set upright, 
several yards distant. It had been placed there, 
she was told, to mark the spot where a young 
girl had been scalped by the Indians. That was 


RACHEL ENNIS. 


Ill 


years and years ago, perhaps long before her great 
grandmother had woven and spun in the low- 
roofed house. It might have been a sunshiny 
morning like this, and the girl might have been 
like her, sorry and ashamed about something, and 
proud of it, and happy because of it. She might 
have been little and ugly, too. 

The sheep were huddled together in a green 
spot down toward the water: they were dingy 
looking things. One of the Montreal boarders 
was sauntering about on tlie green edge near the 
rocks, with a gun over his shoulder, and through 
the bars somebody was coming, — another Mon- 
treal boarder, probably, — a lady, tall, stepping 
lightly and easily, in a gray satin gown, with 
trimmings of cream, and a coarse, yellow straw 
hat. How finely she carried herself! She was 
not little and ugly. And, now that she came 
nearer, her dress was not satin, but satteen. Her 
hands were bare, small, plump, burned red with 
the sun, and the cheek under the hat was burned 
red with the sun. She must be a boat woman 
and fond of any out-of-door sport. The sun and 
the fresh air had roughened her, but they had not 
made her coarse. Her voice, as she turned back 


178 


SECOND BEST, 


and called to somebody, was clear and strong and 
natural : “ Mint, come, I have no time to spare.” 

And Mint — if the name were Mint — came 
running from somewhere behind her, — a boy in 
short gray pants and red stockings and a torn 
straw hat. 

The two passed her, — nob mother and child, for 
the lady could not be over twenty-two or three. 
He called her a pretty name : it sounded like 
Ray.” What a pretty name that would be for 
her ! 

She was a ray of sunshiny womanhood. If she 
were at Captain Davis’s! But what excuse could 
she make for calling ? She might follow them to 
the clam dock, — every one had a right to go there, 
— and she left her sun umbrella there yesterday, 
on a bench in one of the rooms of the clam house. 
She had the air of an English woman, — large, 
fair, tall. She felt as if she were bewitched and 
must follow her. There was a tone of comrade- 
ship in her voice, in speaking to the boy, that must 
bind him to her. Leila felt that it was like her 
own to her father. Listening to the tones and 
laughter of both, not distinguishing the words, she 
made a little romance about them, as she was wont 


RACHEL ENNIS. 


179 


to do with taking strangers : they were orphans, 
English orphans ; their home was in Montreal ; 
tlieir father had been an English officer, their 
mother was a lady, and their grandparents were 
probably living now in some elegant English home. 
The girl had the. air of good society. She was 
self-confident, — no, self-reliant. She had the bear- 
ing of self-knowledge and self-mastery. She was 
an educated woman. She was not like her: she 
was not weak, she was not proud. 

But how much to learn in a minute, and at a 
glance ! She was laughing at herself for being so 
unreasonable and enthusiastic, when anotlier figure 
stepped over the last rail of the bars, — a figure 
that, with her new and confusing self-conscious- 
ness, set her nerves to tingling and her cheeks 
aflame. 

‘‘ Excuse me for my seeming pursuit,” John 
Ostermoor began, seriously, lifting his hat, and 
throwing himself down beside her, ‘‘ but I had to 
come to tell you something.” 

‘‘ I wish you had been here fifteen minutes ago. 
I have fallen in love. I am always falling in love 
with girls, — tall girls, with a great deal of charac- 
ter, — but I never saw one like this English girl.” 


180 


SECOND BEST. 


‘‘ Where is she ? Quick ! ” he inquired, breath- 
lessly. 

“She went toward the clam dock. I haven’t 
been rude enough to watch her, or follow her. A 
boy was with her.” 

“ How did she come ? ” 

“ Through the bars.” 

He laughed, greatly amused. 

“Do throw the veil of your imagination over 
me. I want to be glorified by somebody. I didn’t 
have to circumnavigate the globe to find her. 
Your bewitchment is Rachel Ennis.” 

“ Rachel Ennis ! ” — every long syllable a note 
of astonishment. 

Leila sprang to her feet. In the surprise and 
radiance of the revelation, she was some one John 
Ostermoor had never seen before : she was an 
“ugly little thing” made charming. 

“Now you must keep your promise and stay. 
I’ll go and catch her and bring her here. Sit 
down and listen to my news.” 

“ I don’t Avish to sit doAvn,” she answered, wil- 
fully. 

“ And I don’t wish to get up. How can I tell 

you?” 


RACHEL ENNIS, 


181 


‘‘ Oh, I am going after her.” 

‘‘So am I. You wouldn’t speak without an 
introduction, I hope.” 

“ Who introduced you ? ” she asked, as he lazily 
lifted himself. 

“Mrs. Ostermoor. In the kitchen. We do 
everything in the kitchen here at Ostermoor 
Point. I went to tell her that Sophie is coming 
sooner than I expected, — to-morrow, — and I must 
go to Portland to meet her. And she was full of 
a letter she had from Philadelphia. A lady with 
three small children, who boarded with her two 
summers ago, wishes to come for three months, 
and have the same room she had then, — your room. 
And as Mrs. O. is uncertain about you, and Sophie 
has no idea whether she will stay one week or 
two” — 

“ She would like to have the room,” Leila in- 
terrupted, with the shadow of disappointment in 
her eyes. “ Noav, I want to stay and know Rachel 
Ennis.” 

“Haven’t you anything more pressing in life?” 
he questioned, in astonishment. “ I did not think 
for a moment you were serious. Is your time 
your own ? Can you do as you like ? ” 


182 


SECOND BEST, 


‘‘ My time is altogether my own ; but I cannot 
do anything I like, — unless I choose,” she said, 
laughing at her mysterious way of putting it. “ I 
oughtn’t to do one thing I like ; and, if I discover 
that I like doing the things I don’t like, I wonder 
if I shall have to stop ! ” 

“ I wish you would tell me the rest of it,” he 
said, coaxingly. 

I am afraid I shall,” she answered, hastily. 
‘‘What must I do to deserve it ? ” 

“ If you were the best that is in you, — oh, you 
remind me of something. I copied it in my pocket 
note-book.” 

The small, Russia leather covered book was in her 
pocket. She drew it out, found the place, and asked 
him to read it aloud. It was written in pencil, in a 
clerk’s hand that his father would have delighted 
in. He read it easily and naturally : “ ‘ There are 
many persons of good native powers who never 
really discover themselves. From indolence or 
carelessness they go through life with little effort 
to measure their gifts and to intelligently employ 
them in any worthy achievement. They are con- 
sequently lacking in discipline and poise. They 
are, so far, mere children of nature, who never 


RACHEL ENNIS. 


183 


bring themselves under the tests and guidance of 
reason, and compel themselves to live for some end 
chosen in the light of self-knowledge, and pursued 
with the energy which springs from self-discipline 
and the steadiness which comes from self-control.’ ” 

“ Thank you,” he said. May I read it again ? ” 
Yes.” 

He read it again, with a full appreciation of its 
meaning. 

“ I wish you would let me copy it, — no, I would 
rather you would copy it for me.” 

“ You may tear out the leaf, if you care for it.” 

Very carefully he tore out the leaf, and placed 
it in a wallet he carried in an inner pocket. 

“ I will show it to you again some day.” 

Flushing with a shy pleasure, she made no 
reply. 

“ I would like to show you a photograph I used 
to carry in this wallet, but I tore it up one night 
to help me forget the face. I had no right to look 
at it. Now shall we fly after Rachel ? ” he asked, 
with a quick change of tone. 

‘‘What did you say to Mrs. Ostermoor about 
the chamber ? ” 

“ I told her Sophie would not interfere with her 


184 


SECOND BEST, 


doing better ; and then she said Rachel Ennis 
might be glad to take her, but she did not like to 
speak to you. She evidently thinks you are some 
poor, little, stray bird that needs protection. I 
told her you were crazy to board with Rachel 
Ennis : that was what you were living for. But, 
as she never takes me as I mean, thinking I don’t 
know how to be serious, she was not much im- 
pressed. And then, as if it were planned. Miss 
Rachel Ennis and her jumping-jack of a brother 
appeared at the kitchen door. Without any beat- 
ing about the bush, Mrs. O. asked her if she had 
a room for two boarders, or two rooms for two 
boarders, and she said straightforwardly that was 
what she came to seek.” 

“ Oh, how splendid ! ” cried Leila. Is her 
home among the rocks ? ” 

‘‘ Not as near as we are. She is ten or fifteen 
minutes from the bay, or the landing, — there are 
landings all along the shore, you know, — but you 
wouldn’t mind so short a walk as that. Sophie 
wouldn’t. She asked how long you wished to 
stay, and Mrs. O. said she thought you didn’t 
know yourself.” 

John did not add that Mrs. Ostermoor supposed 


RACHEL ENNIS, 


185 


Miss Provost was a working-girl, and must be back 
at work at some stated time. 

She said you were very generous.” 

“ She had no reason to say that. I was simply 
just. Then I suppose Miss Ennis would like to 
see me.” 

‘‘ Almost as much as you care to see her. I 
wish you would go with me to look at her accom- 
modations. If satisfactory, I would take Sophie 
there. I can bring her over here to see the place 
that I’ve written so enthusiastically about.” 

How far ? ” 

‘‘ Three or four miles.” 

“ Just a good walk.” 

‘‘ I intended you to understand that I invited 
you to drive,” he said, impressively. 

“ Oh, I’d rather walk. And I think I shall like 
to board there. But,” with a feeling of loneliness, 
‘‘ I shall miss Mr. Arnold.” 

So shall I,” he replied. 

Why, are you going ? ” 

‘‘There’s a house opposite. I must be with 
Sophie. Mrs. Grey, — she takes a boarder now 
and then : it seems to be the fashion here. I 
don’t know about Arnold. I wish we could get 


186 


SECOND BEST. 


him to go. Now, come down to the clam dock 
and feast your eyes on Miss Ennis.” 

‘‘T don’t want to. I am afraid of being dis- 
appointed in her. I would rather look at her and 
not speak to her.” 

Then you will not dare live under the same 
roof. It’s well for me that you had no imagina- 
tion about me. Do you know ? — it’s the queer- 
est thing; — she reminds me of some one I used to 
know, — that photograpli I tore up : not her face, 
hardly her manner, in a way I cannot put my 
finger on. I should say she had been under the 
influence of that person, if it Avere possible. She 
reminds me of her as an odor would, or a strain of 
music.” 

He stopped suddenly. I wish you Avould tell 
me what you are thinking.” 

I cannot,” she said. 

Slie Avas thinking that somehoAV the best in him 
Avas being brought out. Had one sight of this 
girl done it ? Or Avas it the memory of that other 
one Avho Avas in the odor and the music ? 

“ I suppose I shall not rest until I ask her if she 
ever knew Anna Ryder. It is something more 
than a reminder of her : she is like her. She is 


RACHEL ENNIS. 


187 


like her as though she admired her. I suppose 
one can’t help becoming like one one admires.” 

Mr. Ostermoor, how do you study human 
nature ? ” 

‘‘ By studying John Ostermoor. Sophie told 
me once that I had a look like Anna Ryder. I 
find a dozen men inside of me every day of my life. 
The best thing has happened to me that can hap- 
pen to any man, — to find out what a fool he is.” 

‘‘ And then ? ” said Leila, with a laugh. 

Don’t you know what then ? ” he asked, 
fiercely. 

‘‘ I know — what I hope,” she answered. 

I wish you hoped in me. I wouldn’t dare ask 
you to have faith in me : it would help me if 
you would.” 

It would help him if any girl would, she thought. 
He waited for her reply ; but she laughed, and 
would not say. 

‘‘ If you ever do, will you tell me ? ” he asked. 

I cannot promise,” she said. “ I believe I am 
afraid of a promise. It would humiliate me to 
break my word.” 

“ I wish you would. You need it. You are the 
proudest bit of human flesh I ever came across.” 


188 


SECOND BEST. 


‘‘Shall we go to Miss Ennis? ” 

“ And this afternoon will you take the walk 
with me ?” 

“ I cannot promise.” 

“ You have got to get there some way.” 

“ And you are very kind to take me, thank you. 

I think I will go there, even if I do not like the 
house, or her grandmother, or her father. I would 
like to help her.” 

“Queen Leila,” he said, teasingly. 

She colored, but she was not angry. It was so 
natural for her to say, “ I would like to help,” 
that she forgot how it might sound in her present 
loAV estate. 

While they were with Rachel Ennis on the 
clam dock, the dinner-bells in front of both houses 
sounded loud and long. 

“You will take dinner with us,” invited Leila,! 
“ and then, perhaps, you will let us walk home ’ 
with you. I know I shall want to stay.” 

Rachel Ennis told her father that afternoon she 
had found the robin redbreast. “ She says she 
will come whether the other girl comes or not. 
The other is rich and can have everything she 
likes ; but Miss Provost is poor, and will not mind 


RACHEL ENNIS. 


189 


our ways. She is not one bit pretty ; but she 
lights up, and you think she is beautiful. You 
don’t know exactly what kind of a light it is, nor 
where it comes from. And it is not always there : 
it comes.” 

To her grandmother she said : ‘‘ I’ve found the 
one I wanted, granny. I guess she’s the other 
side of me.” 

‘‘ Both sides of you are crazy things enough,” 
remarked the old woman. “ What good will come 
to me, I wonder, of turning the house upside 
down ? ” 


“ Farina,” said Rachel, suggestively. 


XI. 


THREE GIRLS. 

“No true man can lire a half life when he has genuinely learned 
that it is only a half life. The other half, the higher half, must 
haunt him .” — Phillips Brooks. 

“ It is only by labor that thought can be made healthy, and only 
by thought that labor can be made happy.” — Ruskin. 

“Not what I have, but what I do, my kingdom is.” — Carhjle. 

“Every day I live I’m sorry that ever I was 
born,” moaned the old woman. 

Leila had been reading a story from a weekly 
jiaper to the grandmother. The story Avas nof 
depressing, and the old woman’s remark at the 
happy conclusion startled the reader into an ex- 
clamation. 

“Why, Mrs. Ennis ! Tlien I’d be born another 
time, if I Avere you, and be born different.” 

“ H’m ! You don’t knoAv Avhat you are talking 
about.” 

“ I do,” said Leila. “ Being born once is an 
endless sorrow if one is not born again.” 

Nathan Ennis heard the Avords and AvalkedaAvay 
thinking of them. He liked this little thing that 


THREE GIRLS. 


191 


hopped about like a bird. She was as gentle as a 
dove, with a voice like a thrush. She had spoken 
the truth, and he knew it : his life was an endless 
sorrow. 

The old woman’s head fell forward, as she 
dropped into sudden sleep. With the paper in 
lier hand, Leila left her to write letters before the 
twelve o’clock dinner. She had learned to like a 
twelve o’clock dinner : indeed, she liked anything 
that Rachel Ennis had to do with. This girl was 
more interesting to her than any book she had 
ever read. 

Her window overlooked the back of the house. 
As she sat writing, with her writing tablet in her 
lap, she glanced now and then out the window 
and in at the doorway of the shed where Delia 
stood at a rude table, peeling potatoes. 

“You are peeling those potatoes too thick.” 
This was the voice of Rachel. 

“I know it,” answered Delia, with a provoked 
slash into a fine potato. “ Yesterday I took time 
and pains, and wasted both ; and to-day I’m try- 
ing to save both, and my temper, too. I was mad 
yesterday, when I scraped the plates, to see how 
much of your delicious mashed potato was left 


192 


SECOND BEST, 


on their plates. They all left some. You do help 
so abundantly, Rachel, and, besides that, there 
were parts of potato cakes, from the same mashed 
potatoes left this morning at breakfast. I had to 
throw the stuff to the chickens. What else can I 
do? We can’t feed ourselves on their leavings, 
and you have to buy these new potatoes. Yester- 
day I reckoned that I saved one whole potato by 
my careful peeling, — possibly two, I peeled so 
many, — and I did it to have my saving thrown 
to the chickens. I don’t work for chiekens^^^ with 
another slash into a potato. 

Rachel had to think a moment before she knew 
how to put into clear words the thought in her 
mind. 

Why not as well believe that the one or two 
you saved were eaten by people instead of the 
chickens ? Say that five were thrown out : if you 
had not saved two, seven would have been thrown 
out.” 

But do I work and take pains for other people 
to waste. I’d like to know?” cried Delia, her tone 
gathering indignation. 

‘‘ You do not work for other people at all. You 
work to do your best. A handsomely peeled po- 


THREE GIRLS. 


193 


tato is a pretty piece of work. You say you 
would like to be an artist. Why not begin by 
peeling a potato in artistic fashion? And, then, 
there’s the satisfaction in doing one’s best.” 

Rachel at the ironing-board was giving a gloss 
to John Ostermoor’s shirt-bosom as she talked. 

The wasted is what touched me. When you 
liave to pay money for them, too. But five in- 
stead of seven thrown out is a consideration. And 
I suppose I can’t help it if other people waste our 
money.” 

The sharp knife was shaping the potato with 
thin precision. The large potato, dropped into the 
pan of water, had a beauty of its own. 

I suppose that is the way the man with the 
two talents worked,” Rachel said, turning to look 
at the potato. 

The pen was idle in Leila’s fingers while she 
listened to every word. She decided to ask Rachel 
to tell her all she knew about the man with the 
two talents ; and then into her letter went the con- 
versation about peeling potatoes. It was the first 
time in her life that she had thought whether or 
not a potato had anything to be peeled, and here 
was this girl getting a thought out of a potato 


194 


SECOND BEST, 


skin. Her father would enjoy that. He would 
wish her to stay with this Rachel Ennis and learn 
about common things, — at four dollars a week. 
She was saving a dollar a week on her board now. 
Saving a dollar was a new experience and a serious 
matter. It would help in the walking shoes she 
needed. She was beginning to feel a sympathy 
with people who had to wear old shoes. Rachel’s 
shoes were very worn: a glance at them had 
brought her into closer sympathy with the wearer. 
Was this the secret of sympathy? Did one have 
to feel with as well as for? And was it worth 
while go through things one’s self simply that one 
might be sympathetic ? 

She could help without feeling it so? So might 
Christ have done, she thought, without becoming 
poor for our sakes ! But would he have been the 
same Christ so us? ‘‘This same Jesus.” How 
that truth had filled her heart when she was with 
her father, knowing he must soon go to him : he 
was going to the same J esus who had walked and 
talked with men. 

She might give help without having gone 
through the same strait; but would not people 
take it differently if they knew she had been in 
their place? 


THREE GIRLS. 


195 


It began with Christ, this suffering, that one 
might help ; and every one, to be like him, must 
suffer in themselves. Sophie had not noticed 
Rachel’s shoes. She had never mended her own 
and polished them, and then, with these improve- 
ments, kept them nervously hidden under the folds 
of her skirt. One of Leila’s specialties had been 
handsome and perfectly fitting shoes. 

W ould this experience help her only with shoes ? 
Must she have a like experience with gloves? 
After this, when she had money again, how she 
would delight to make girls happy with gifts of 
fine handkerchiefs, and postage stamps, and cologne 
and, — why, everything that girls liked and did not 
know how to do without. She did not know how ; 
but she was doing it. 

And then there was a laugh from the shed, and 
she was listening again. 

“ That room is not only dark, but it’s 
said Delia, positively. 

“As if a place could be dark without being 
damp,” retorted John Ostermoor. 

“A hot stove oven, for instance,” was Rachel’s 
merry rejoinder. 

A frown darkened Leila’s face. That kitchen 


196 


SECOND BEST. 


shed was hardly the place for John Ostermoor. 
Yesterday noon he had scraped and piled together 
the dinner dishes for Rachel, because Delia had 
a headache and was sent to bed; and Leila was 
not at all sure that he had not wiped them. 

“But can’t you fix it up forme?” John was 
persuading. “I don’t like it over the way. I 
want to be here.” 

“Perhaps Miss Leila would room with your 
sister,” suggested Rachel. 

“ Don’t ask her,” proposed Delia, hastily. “ She 
has the air of a princess already. I never saw a 
foor person put on such airs before.” 

Leila gave a push to the tablet on her lap, and 
darted away from the window. She was angry, 
and then she became reasonable, and smiled. 

“ Putting on airs” she detested : it was not the 
mark of a lady. I think it would have hurt Leila 
more that day to have been thought not a Chris- 
tian than not a lady. 

Snatching her hat from a nail behind the door, 
she ran downstairs. Sophie had gone to the shore. 
The pretty, spoiled little thing was insipid some- 
times ; but Leila loved to talk to somebody, and 
Sophie was somebody to talk to, even when she 


THREE GIRLS. 


197 


did insist upon filling every moment with accounts 
with what herself and “ papa ” did abroad. 

Her loving intonation of “papa” gave father- 
less Leila a heartache. Leila hated her when was 
patronizing. It suited the little lady well to be 
patroness. She was already planning what she 
could do to bring two or three pretty dresses into 
Leila’s wardrobe. Might she ask her to do sewing, 
or could she take her home for a “ companion ” ? 

“ You are so very intelligent,” the stupid little 
thing had remarked to Leila. 

Her brother had glowered at her, and she pouted 
and wondered what should make John so cross. 
Something always happened to make him look 
cross when she talked to Miss Provost. 

She thought she was very respectful to address 
her as Miss Provost, when she was so evidently a 
working-girl on an unexpected vacation, — a work- 
ing-giii, but still so very ladylike and intelligent. 
She had ways and airs ; but that must be because 
she was proud, and perhaps had associated with 
ladies. She was the first working-girl Sophie had 
ever been thrown with. She was sure she was a 
working-girl, because she spoke so proudly of in- 
dependent and self-reliant girls. It was the effort 


198 


SECOND BEST. 


of Sophie’s days to discover, without being im- 
pertinent, what she did to support herself. Per- 
haps she was in an office. It was not so bad to be 
in an office. 

Leila crossed the road, and found a path through 
a lawn that ended down among the rocks and sea- 
weeds. With a sun-umbrella over her head, 
Sophie was standing on the pier, watching the 
approach of the Alice ” from Ostermoor Point, 
three miles up the bay. The yellow head and 
white dress were bewitching. Leila loved babies 
and little girls, and Sophie Ostermoor had a touch 
of both. 

“ I expected to find you on the rocks,” Sophie 
called. 

was out before breakfast,” answered Leila, 
stepping over the rocks toward her. 

“ I wish my papa were on that steamer.” 

“ Do you need two people to take care of you ? ” 
questioned Leila, merrily. 

‘‘Yes. And I want papa to see John. John 
has grown so, — up and away from me. He talks 
about things he never used to. He says his life is 
only half a life. He frightens me. He is more 
impetuous than ever, in a quiet, still, deep-down 


THREE GIRLS. 


199 


way ; and he says he won’t go into the office, and 
that will make papa angry again. He says he 
wants to do something for men., instead of making 
money.” 

Earning money is a small part of money wis- 
dom.” 

“ It takes brains and push to earn money, — papa 
says so,” said Sophie, decidedly. “ He has made 
a great deal of money.” 

“ ‘ Put not your trust in money, ’ ” quoted Leila, 
“ but put your money in trust.” 

Oh, papa does that,” Sophie returned, con- 
tentedly. “ He says my share is safe.” 

“ I would like to know what is the safest thing 
to do with money,” meditated Leila, resting her 
elbows on the rude railing, and watching the 
Alice.” 

Why, how does it con ” — 

— ‘‘ cern me ? ” finished Leila. “ Don’t mind. 
You didn’t ask it. I think I would like to be a 
wise steward, with a dollar a day.” 

“ That is not much to earn.” 

But I’d be proud if I earned it.” 

Why, donH you ? ” asked Sophie, eager in her 
surprise and curiosity. 


200 


SECOND BEST. 


I never earned a cent in my life. I never was 
paid a cent. I would like to have some money 
value in the market of life. I would like to 
know that somebody could get a dollar’s worth of 
equivalent out of me.” 

‘‘ Can you sew ? ” asked Sophie, guardedly. 

“ Oh, yes. I am satisfied with my plain needle- 
work. But anybody can be a needle-woman. I 
suppose I would like to be sure that my brain is 
worth its weight in silver and gold.” 

‘‘ How much does your brain weigh ? ” 

‘‘A thousand pounds, when I have headache. 
Are you interested in the brain ? ” 

‘‘Not particularly. I thought a brain’s weight 
wasn’t much in silver. John has been reading to 
Dr. Ennis, and he told me some things he said 
about the brain. He made it very interesting. 
He can make anything interesting he talks about. 
Papa will not like him to get ideas away from the 
office, and that’s why I don’t like him to listen to 
that thin, queer, dried-up blind man. He thinks 
knowing about yourself is the first work of man. 
John’s always carried away by new things. He 
says he’s on the track of finding out what he is 
made for. He isn’t made to disappoint papa — 
again.” 


THREE GIRLS. 


201 


Sophie’s blue eyes slowly filled. Leila did not 
know she was demonstrative ; but, before she 
knew it, she had put her arm about the white 
little figure beside her. 

I love them both so hard, and I can’t make 
them love each other. They canH do what each 
other likes best. Life is very disappointing ; don’t 
you think so ? ” 

Something is. I don’t think it is life. Rachel 
Ennis isn’t disappointed.” 

“ Oh, she only works. She hasn’t aspirations,” 
said Sophie, with ladylike contempt. “I don’t 
believe I understand her.” 

It would be well to remember that when you 
make remarks about her,” retorted Leila, severely. 

Perhaps I don’t understand you, either,” apol- 
ogized Sophie. 

‘‘ I should be sorry if you could,” with a devout- 
ness that Sophie laughed at, only half comprehend- 
ing. Queen Victoria can do nothing for Rachel 
Ennis but stand out of her sunshine.” 

She might come and board with her,” Sophie 
remarked, “ and pay good board.” 

“ But she wouldn’t take more than four dollars 
a week, even from Her Majesty, and seventy-five 
cents a dozen for her washing.” 


202 


SECOND BEST, 


She takes five from me.” 

Because your room is larger than mine.” 

“ I don’t believe ihat^% the only reason,” ad- 
mitted Sophie. 

“ That is reason sufficient,” said Leila. “ And 
perhaps I look as if I couldn’t afford more.” 

Sophie was glad Leila could be so frank about 
her poverty. Something hindered her from tell- 
ing her she was glad she was not proud. Per- 
haps it was the remembrance of John’s crossness. 


XII. 


ON THE WAY TO A FIXED PURPOSE. 

It is better to do the idlest thing in the world than to sit idle 
for half an hour.” — Sterne. 

“ Do you think mine an impossible ideal ? Be it so, refuse to 
accept it, if you will. All that I ask of you is to have a fixed 
purpose of some kind for your country and yourselves ; no matter 
how restricted, so that it be fixed and unselfish.” — Raskin. 

‘‘ If my life must be humdrum, I will make a 
variety in the hum and drum of it,” Leila said, 
with a laugh. 

It was the same day she had found Sophie on 
the pier watching the “ Alice.” Early supper Avas 
over, and the girls were sitting on a rug on the 
grass, in front of the kitchen windows and door- 
way. In an hour the dampness would drive them 
indoors. Dr. Ennis was already driven indoors. 
These intrusive girls had driA^en him aAvay from 
his own dinner-table ; for he would not find his 
hesitating way to his lips in the presence of curi- 
ous eyes, and now they had taken possession of 
his own special grass. 


204 


SECOND BEST. 


He was sitting in the kitchen, beside his mother. 
Sometimes he believed his mother loved him bet- 
ter than his children loved him. 

‘‘ Are you getting it out of advertisements ? ” 
Sophie inquired, cuddling herself close to Leila, 
resting her head on her shoulder while she looked 
at the column in the paper Leila was searching. 

‘‘Yes,” half in fun, and wholly in earnest. “I 
think if I can see what other women do without 
money it will suggest something to me.” 

“ Then you are — out of employment ? ” Sophie 
asked, cautiously. 

“Decidedly out,” was the prompt reply. “I 
think I shall ask Miss Rachel to teach me how to 
peel potatoes.” 

Drawing the paper toward her, Sophie read 
aloud : “ ‘ A lady desirous of pursuing the study 
of design in New York City would sew each 
afternoon in return for her board. Is thoroughly 
capable to fit, drape, and finish dresses.’ Can you 
do that ? ” 

“No. I can only appreciate a good fit, and 
finish a dress by wearing it out in no time. Read 
on. 

In a gleeful tone, Sophie read on: “‘Wanted 


A FIXED PURPOSE. 


205 


by a maiden lady of thirty, position as house- 
keeper, care-taker, seamstress, or any occupation 
where integrity and ability would be appreciated.’ ” 
“My ability falls far short,” exclaimed Leila. 
“ And I am not a maiden lady of thirty yet. Hear 
this : ‘ A young gentlewoman suddenly depend- 
ent ’ ” — 

“ I think that must be you,” interrupted Sophie. 
— “ ‘ seeks a remunerative position,’ ” read Leila. 
“ ‘ Accomplished vocalist, reader, and writer, and 
finds her singing of great use in quieting and 
diverting invalids suffering from nervous prostra- 
tion, hysteria, and melancholia.’ ” 

“Deliver me!” cried Sophie, devoutly. “I 
should get melancholia myself.” 

“‘ An unusual opportunity,’ ” read Leila, gravely, 
“ ‘ to secure as companion or chaperon the services 
of a refined, cultured woman. Social connec- 
tions undoubted. Highest Boston and New York 
City credentials.’ Poor thing,” said Leila, sympa- 
thetically. “I’d rather peel potatoes. I see I’m 
not the only girl looking for a vocation.” 

“ Oh, no ! The woods are full of them,” replied 
John, who had stepped out the kitchen doorway 
behind them. 


206 


SECOND BEST. 


Rachel’s merry eyes were peering over the heads 
of the two girls. ^ 

‘ If you have anything to do, 

Don’t let it daunt you ; 

For then you will be a dunce, 

And nobody will want you,’ ” 

she chanted. “ I should think such advertisements 
would make girls more content to stay home. I 
would like Delia to hear them : she is as restless 
as ” — 

‘‘A discontented girl,” supplemented John. 
‘‘ Of all things a discontented girl is the meanest 
to have around.” 

‘‘Next to a discontented boy,” retorted Leila. 
“Now, listen. We shall find something to fit 
somebody. ‘A young lady wishes a position as 
companion to an elderly lady or invalid.’ ” 

“Miss Rachel has that already,” remarked John. 
“I think she fills several of these coveted posi- 
tions.” 

“ ‘ A young lady,’ ” continued Leila, “ ‘ who has 
studied six years in Paris and Berlin, wishes to 
give lessons in painting and languages in exchange 
for board.’” 

“Board seems the thing to be desired in this 


A FIXED PURPOSE. 


207 


world,” observed John. ‘‘Miss Rachel, would you 
like to give board in exchange for that?” 

“ Indeed I would,” said Rachel. “ I had to give 
up French and Latin when I left school, and I 
loved them.” 

“Did you?” asked Leila, incredulously, and 
wondering instantly if her French and Latin might 
be of use to this girl who had to “ give up ” some- 
thing she loved. But she read on, and tucked the 
suggestion away for future consideration. 

“ ‘ Instruction in music and a home are offered 
a young lady of reliable character, who will in 
return assist in the care of a young child and do 
light housework.’ ” 

“ Oh, what an opportunity for somebody ! ” ex- 
claimed Rachel, who had heavy housework and 
two invalids, with no music thrown in. 

“ ‘ A lady who desires a home,’ ” read Leila. 

“Oh, do so many ladies need homes?” asked 
Sophie, almost tearful with sympathy. “ I am so 
sorry. I never thought of reading stupid adver- 
tisements to learn about how people suffer.” 

“And opportunities,” consoled Rachel. “Don’t 
you see how there is something for everybody who 
knows how? ” 


208 


SECOND BEST. 


And then she read, in an eager tone, ‘‘‘A lady 
who desires a home may find a good one with a 
small family, where a person of reliability is 
needed in the partial care of a child, general over- 
sight, mending, etc., etc.’ ” 

I am afraid it is the etc. I am not equal to,” 
acknowledged Leila, comically. “But I like 
‘A lady much accustomed to foreign travel with 
her own family, and speaking several languages, 
would take motherly charge of one young lady, 
or more, for a lengthened foreign tour. Presenta- 
tions at Court, if desired.’ Now that exactly 
suits me.” 

“It takes money, though,” suggested Sophie, 
forgetting that her brother was within sound of 
her voice. 

“Yes,” returned Leila, “and time.” 

“ I’d like to be presented,” said Sophie. “ I know 
a girl who was, and she had such elegant dresses.” 

“I am not sure that I have\ime,” answered 
Leila, to whom the hours of her day were becom- 
ing something new and valuable ; for had not 
every day of her three years its special work? 

“Why, what are you doing now that is better?” 
questioned Sophie, in wide-eyed surprise. 


A FIXED PURPOSE. 


209 


Learning what a goose I am,” was the reply, 
so fervently given that all the listeners laughed. 

“It does give one a sensation to have one’s life 
viewed from some one else’s standpoint,” she 
added. “ I believe that is a part of the good of 
seeing new — and different people.” 

Sophie looked uncomprehending. John gave 
emphatic assent. 

“ It’s damp,” Sophie said, after a moment, rising 
with a new air of weariness. 

She went up to her room and cried, with her 
head pressed into her pillow. Had you asked her 
why she was crying, she would have told you she 
did not know. But she did know ; she had 
known a long time. To herself she said, “I’m so 
wicked, and I’m so tired of being wicked, and 
nobody talks to me or shows me how to be good.” 

Leila Provost could talk about everything under 
the sun ; but she never spoke one word about how 
to get good and stay good after you felt you were 
wicked. She thought John had learned some- 
thing new ; but he had not thought it worth while 
to tell her, and she could not ask him : she could 
not ask anybody. 

Rachel knew, she was sure she knew ; but she 


210 


SECOND BEST, 


was always doing something, and never thought 
how her heart was aching over all the sins of all 
her life. It was not a new thing to cry like this. 
She had tried to pray for a whole year, and to go 
to church, and to finds books ; but it was not in 
any book she saw around, and she did not know 
what book to buy. She did not even know where 
to read in the Bible ; and she had come away and 
forgotten to put her Bible in her trunk. 

There was a little book always open on the 
bureau in Rachel’s room. She wished she dared 
go in and snatch something out of it. 

But somebody was coming. Was it John? He 
would laugh at her and tease her. She sprang up 
to fasten her door, and then threw herself back on 
the pillow. 

The tap at the door annoyed her. She sprang 
up to open it with an ungracious frown ; but it 
was Rachel, and she smiled. 

“ Excuse me for coming so late ; but Delia 
sometimes forgets the second round, and I was 
afraid you needed water or towels or something.” 

“I do need — something,” replied Sophie, with 
a quickness unusual to her. “I’m ashamed to 
have people see me cry ; but I think I don’t mind 
you. Will you come in ? ” 


A FIXED PURPOSE. 


211 


Stepping to the wash-stand, Rachel removed a 
soiled towel, replacing it by one as sweet and 
fresh as her own laundry work could make it. 

“Please tell me when Delia forgets anything. 
She isn’t used to thinking of — such things.” 

Sophie brushed back her hair with both hands, 
and dropped her little self into the small cushioned 
rocker Rachel had brought from her own chamber 
for her comfort. 

“I thought you were so happy, Miss Sophie, 
like a bird, or a kitten, or a frisky lamb, with noth- 
ing to be sorry about.” 

“ I am glad I look so. I like to. I had to for 
papa ; but ” — 

The tears swelled into drops : she hastily 
brushed them off, with a quick laugh. 

“ I know,” said Rachel. And then she said, 
very gently : “ I hope you know how to be com- 
forted. You and I haven’t any mother; but God 
is like such a loving mother.” 

“Is He?” asked Sophie, her eyes widening; 
“but not when one has done nothing but wicked, 
selfish things, and never once thought about things 
He would like.” 

With the towels on her arm, and forgetting her 


212 


SECOND BEST. 


errand in Leila’s room, Rachel drew the nearest 
chair nearer to Sophie, and laid her hand on the 
pretty, dimpled fingers in Sophie’s lap. 

That is the time when He is comforting. That 
is what His comfort is for. You go to Him to get 
forgiveness. He has enough for all the world ; it 
is laid up ; His heart is a store-house full of it. I 
go to Him and get it every day, and there’s always 
more for me, and will be as long as I need it to 
comfort me. You have repentance, — He has given 
it to you : He has given it to you, that you may 
get His forgiveness. Do you want that more than 
anything ? ” 

But Sophie was sobbing and could not speak. 
Some one had told her at last. 

“We do not go to him to be condemned and 
punished; that is for people who are never sorry, 
and who keep on being rebellious. His forgive- 
ness is for the soft, broken heart, like yours.” 

“ How do you know ? ” Sophie asked, brokenly. 

“You have told me about your father, — how do 
I know it is true ? ” 

“ Because I am his child, and I know him,” was 
her confident reply. 

“ And I am God’s child, and I know Him.” 


A FIXED PURPOSE. 


213 


“ I believe that,” said Sophie. 

“ And you are His child, too, — His penitent 
child.” 

“I am sorry about everything,” Sophie an- 
swered, sobbing. I have been sorry a long, long 
time, but 1 didn’t know how to be forgiven.” 

“ God knows how to forgive : that is all you 
have to think of. Don’t you know about Jesus 
Christ? — how God loved the world so that He 
sent him into it, to live for us, and die for us, and 
go back to heaven to pray for us ? ” 

‘‘I know a little, but I don’t understand. Will 
you tell me the rest ? ” 

All her life Rachel had longed to bring some 
one to Christ : to find some one and bring her as 
Andrew brought his brothers. ‘‘ And he brought 
him to Jesus.” The beautiful words were marked 
in her Bible. 

“ I will read you the rest. There are no words 
like the words in the Gospel of John. John saw 
Jesus and knew all about him, and the Holy 
Spirit taught him how to write it. Shall I bring 
my Bible ? I do not see yours.” 

‘‘I haven’t any here,” Sophie acknowledged. 
‘‘I don’t know if John has one. I didn’t like to 


214 


SECOND BEST. 


ask him. Papa isn’t — like you, nor my aunt. I 
never knew any one like you. I had a lovely 
friend once, but she never talked to me about 
being good — in your way. She talked about 
lovely things, and told me to have an ideal ; but 
she never told me how to be forgiven. I must be 
forgiven first. I haven’t any heart to do anything 
good until I am sure of that.” 

“ Have you asked for it ? ” 

“Yes, in a kind of way. But it never did any 
good. I wasn’t speaking to anybody real.” 

“God will be real when you know Jesus Christ, 
whom He sent to speak to us. \Yhen he speaks, 
it is God speaking, and every word is as true as 
God is.” 

Rachel lighted the lamp on Sophie’s bureau, 
then brought her Bible, and the two pushed their 
chairs in front of the bureau. Sophie listened 
while Rachel read, with the manner and confidence 
of a little child. 

“ ‘ God sent not His Son into the world to con- 
demn the world, but that the world through him 
might be saved.’ ” 

Sophie laid her hand on Rachel’s, to stay the 
reading. 


A FIXED PURPOSE. 


215 


“Tell me what that means.” 

“ God sent His Son : that was like coming 
Himself, He loved the world so ; and you are in 
the world, a sinner, and He came, not to condemn 
and punish you, but to find you, and make you 
feel sorry and repentant, and save you from sin- 
ning any more and being lost away from Him for- 
ever. He finds us and keeps us, and we never can 
be lost again. We can be with Him every day 
now, learning more and more about Him all the 
time, and by and by we are with Him forever. 
We are lost, first, you know, lost in the world, 
and He finds us, and keeps us, and that is being 
saved.” 

“Am I saved now, — to-night?” Sophie asked, 
eagerly. 

“I don’t know why not,” said Rachel, simply. 
“I am sure we are saved as soon as we are found.” 

“ If I knew how to ask Him,” said Sophie. 

“ You do. You have asked Him without any 
words. You can tell Him as easily as you can tell 
me.” 

Sophie dropped her head into Rachel’s lap, 
and covered her face with both hands. Over her 
head, with her hand on its pretty, soft hair, Rachel 


216 


SECOND BEST. 


told God how sorry they were to sin and grieve 
Him, and how glad they were of His love, that 
did not condemn them, but found them and kept 
them safe, and washed all the guilt and love of 
sin away in the precious blood of Christ. 

“ Good-night, dear.” 

And then Rachel went away, singing softly, 
happier than she had ever been in all her life. 

Downstairs Leila and John were still looking 
over advertisements in her pile of papers: they 
were in the parlor, at the table. 

‘“No one unable to endure hardships “In His 
Name ” need apply,’ ” read John. “ What a queer 
thing to put in a paper. Who would apply? ” 


XIII. 


THREE STORIES. 

** I believe you will find the love of praise to be one of the chief 
motives of human action ; nay, that love itself is the rendering of 
an exquisite praise to body and soul. The Saxon word “ love is 
connected through the old French verb “ lover, with the Latin 
lauSj not amor, and you may sum the duty of your life in the giving 
of praise worthily, and being yourselves worthy of it/’ — Ruskin. 

I can’t ask God to bless everything,” remarked 
Mint, disconsolately. 

“ What, for instance ? ” inquired Leila. 

She had never been interested in children, and 
this indolent, stupid, and bright boy was a study. 

He was perched on top of the stone wall, look- 
ing down at her. She was sitting on the grass at 
his feet, with her lap full of goldenrod. Two 
hours ago she had gathered the goldenrod on 
Cousin’s Island. She had never found in any 
ramble such rods of golden bloom. John had 
asked her if she wished they were all pure gold. 

No,” she said, too gravely for him to understand, 
thinking of the gold tried in the fire. 

Mosquitoes,” answered Mint, bringing her 
back from her goldenrod. 


218 


SECOND BEST, 


“ Don’t you want them blessed ? Blessed means 
happy. What would make them happy?” 

Leila believed that she did not know how to 
talk to children : Mint talked to her. 

‘‘ Some of me ! A whole, red, sweet drop of me. 
I’ve been reading about them. I read about most 
things.” 

“ ‘ Let everything that hath breath praise the 
Lord,’ ” quoted Leila. “ Don’t you want mosqui- 
toes to praise Him ? ” 

“No: I don’t! Not if their breath is made out 
of me. When I get to heaven, the first question I 
shall ask will be about mosquitoes, — what they 
are good for.” 

Rachel’s good-night talks with her brother gave 
him a life in both worlds. 

“You haven’t got to wait till then, young 
fellow,” cried a voice behind him among the trees. 
“ Just wait till I get over there ! ” 

“ Then your coming, for one thing, is just as 
good as going to heaven,” said the boy, medita- 
tively, turning to him wdth saucy eyes. 

“ There are lots of things to be found out down 
here,” answered John Ostermoor’s voice. “It is 
sheer laziness to wait.” 


THREE STORIES. 


219 


‘‘ I wasn’t lazy,” returned Mint, still in his med- 
itative voice. “ I’m never lazy. Ray doesn’t 
know, and I thought nobody could know.” 

John made his way over the stones, and threw 
himself down, in his lazy fashion, on the grass 
beside Leila. 

‘‘ Mosquitoes, young gentleman, have been boiled 
down and crystallized. Their substance has been 
discovered to contain the same properties as qui- 
nine, and, as they abound in malarial districts, if 
you will put the two facts together, your question 
will be answered. Did you think there was any- 
thing on this earth made just to bother people, and 
for no earthly good besides ? ” 

‘‘ Granny says I was born just to be a bother.” 

If she will let me boil you down. I’ll prove to 
her that you are good for something. Why aren’t 
you picking the blackberries your sister asked you 
for?” 

‘‘Do you do everything your sister asks you 
to?” was the unexpected retort. 

“She asked me to row her to the island this 
morning: didn’t I do that?” 

“That was fun. And you wouldn’t take me. 
Would you pick blackberries for her?” 


220 


SECOND BEST, 


“ I hope I would,” John answered, looking at 
him severely. 

‘‘ Then come with me. These are for her. Ray 
said I must get them, — a whole lot, — because Miss 
Sophie liked them.” 

In an instant the little fellow was twitched off 
his unsteady stone, and pitched up into the air, 
then caught, and slung over John’s shoulder. 
Twelve-year-old Mint had the weight and height 
of a boy of nine. 

“ I’ll be the good-natured giant, and eat you up, 
if you don’t scamper. If I see you loafing again 
before you have three quarts of big, soft berries, 
you shall lose your trip on the ‘ Alice.’ ” 

‘‘ When will you take me, if I get the berries ? ” 

‘‘ To-morrow, if the girls will go.” 

Mint slid down to the ground and stood before 
John, with his legs wide apart, and a small, fat: 
hand stuffed into each pocket of his pants. 

“ Who are the girls ? There are four of them 
about.” 

‘‘ Miss Leila and my sister.” 

“ Miss Leila won’t go. She never will do any- 
thing you ask her,” he tossed saucily back, as he 
ran off. 


THREE STORIES. 


221 


“Did you ever see such goldenrod?” asked 
Leila, lightly, with her embarrassed eyes shielded 
by the huge bunch in her hand. 

“ Where is Sophie ? ” he asked, discontentedly. 

“ In our room, lying down with headache. That 
sun on the water was too bright and hot for her. 
She looked unhappy after wandering off with Mr. 
Arnold.’' 

“Nothing is too bright and hot for you, too wet 
or dry, too hard or soft, too thick or thin. You 
grow happy by the day.” 

“ Do I ? ” she asked, with a happy laugh. “ I 
am so glad to be here. I feel so satisfied. I 
hardly know what does it.” 

“Does ‘here’ mean with Rachel Ennis?” he 
asked, still discontentedly. 

“ Perhaps. I hardly know that.” 

“You have been here with her some time. 
When are you going?” 

“ Where ? ” she questioned, in quick surprise. 

“ I wish I knew. I wish I knew whether you 
cared more for love or admiration.” 

Dropping the goldenrod suddenly, she looked 
into his face as he lay stretehed beside her. Her 
impulse was to tell him the whole truth about her- 


222 


SECOND BEST. 


self. She stood in a false relation toward him. 
Would she think him true if he consciously held 
himself in a false relation toward her ? But if it 
made no difference to him, — and how could it? 
and it certainly made no difference to her, — 
whether he knew her as poor or rich. It should 
not make any difference to her whether they knew 
each other at all. And what difference could it 
make to him whether she cared more for love or 
for admiration? 

While she was debating within herself, he spoke 
in another tone : — 

I have learned that my impression about 
Rachel was correct. She was under the influence 
of my friend all one summer. Anna Ryder 
boarded at the Greys’. May I tell you that story ? 
I wonder if you care about something that hap- 
pened to me once ! ” 

She did care : she cared so much that she could 
not say easily : I do care. Tell me, please.” 
During the time that she had boarded with 
Rachel Ennis, and he had been at the house oppo- 
site, they had been together constantly, — indoors, 
in the large, pleasant parlor, while he read aloud 
to her and Sophie, and out of doors, everywhere? 


THREE STORIES. 


223 


rowing, playing croquet, taking long walks, ex- 
ploring the country in every direction; and on 
Sundays he had gone to church with her and 
Sophie, and one Wednesday evening in the small 
prayer-meeting, in the church, he had risen, and 
spoken, in his natural, honest way, his purpose to 
learn all he could about Jesus Christ, and try to 
do what he told him to do. She was learning 
something about John Ostermoor every day. 

“No matter, if you don’t care,” he said, hastily 
and bitterly. “ I never saw any one like you. You 
open a door, and give me a glimpse of something 
good and bright and strong, and then you shut it 
hard and quick, and double bar it, and bar me 
out.” 

“ It isn’t polite to bang a door in people’s faces,” 
she returned, with a laugh. 

“ It isn’t he answered, indignantly. “ I 

don’t care about the politeness.” 

“I would rather you would not tell me any- 
thing about yourself until — you know me better.” 

“ I shall never know you better at this rate,” he 
burst out. 

“ Perhaps there isn’t anything behind those 
barred doors worth finding.” 


224 


SECOND BEST. 


That isn’t true : you know it isn’t. You are 
false in saying it.” 

‘‘ I wish — is it a queer thing to ask ? — how do 
I impress you? No, not that: what do you think 
I am?” 

‘^You are a snarl, a knot, a tangle. One day 
I think you are one thing, and the next another. 
Do I hurt you? You asked me.” 

“ Oh, no, thank you. Sophie thinks so, too.” 

‘‘She says, — but she had no right to say it.” 

“ I will ask her what she thinks. I will tell 
you both together.” 

“ Tell us what ? ” 

“ My story,” she said, with effort. 

“ I knew you had one.” 

“ Who hasn’t ? ” 

“Rachel. You can see through and through 
her.” 

With a sharp cry, as if in sudden pain, Leila 
dropped her head in her lap, among the goldenrod. 

“ I wish I hadn’t acknowledged that I had some- 
thing to tell. I don’t know how to make you 
understand.” 

“ Then don’t, dear,” he said, as naturally as if 
speaking to his sister. “I’ll forget all about it; 


THREE STORIES. 


225 


but I want to tell you about Anna Ryder. Can 
you listen now ? ” 

“ Oh, yes,” raising her head, with a sobbing 
breath. “ I am afraid I am not true if I do not 
tell you who I am ; and, if I do, I am afraid you 
will think I am strong and selhdenying, and I am 
weaker than a child, and as selfish as I can be. If 
you should praise me, it would break my heart.” 

“ I’d like to see your heart broken. I’m glad it 
can break, — proud thing ! ” 

I am too proud not to tell you. I hate myste- 
ries and sensationalism. I feel as if I were living 
in a cheap story-book, Avritten in the ‘deepening 
pool of darkening anguish’ style. And it is all 
as simple and good as my father was, and as I am 
hoping to be. Sophie wanted to share her perfum- 
ery and handsome letter paper with me.” 

“ She Avould like to share all her possessions 
with you,” he interrupted. “ She’s daft about you.” 

“ The darling ! ” exclaimed Leila. “ There she 
is.” 

In the rear kitchen doorway a figure appeared, — 
a little thing in white, for Sophie Ostermoor was 
still a little thing, — with a yellow head, holding a 
broad straw hat in her hand. She was sweet and 


226 


SECOND BEST, 


simple and true. She was like her brother, but 
without his will power and intellect. 

‘‘Come here, little girl,” called John. 

She came across the field to them, holding her 
hat in her hand. She still loved her brother best, 
and then her father. 

“Sophie, we are telling each other stories. We 
were waiting for you. I want to tell Leila about 
Anna Ryder.” 

“ I know something about her, John. It was 
that that gave me a headache.” Leila moved, and 
drew her down beside her on the shawl she always 
carried about to throw upon the grass where she 
sat. John put both arms about his sister and 
kissed her. Leila thought no one could see John 
Ostermoor with his sister without wishing she had 
a big brother. 

“ What is it? Have you found her?” 

“Yes : I didn’t, but somebody found her for me. 
I don’t want to tell papa.” 

“ Is she — is she ” — 

“ Oh, no : she isn’t dead. She is well and 
happy. O John, I didn’t think she could do so ! 
She is married.” 

John’s arms tightened about her. He had 


THREE STORIES. 


227 


thought he did not care. For an instant every- 
thing grew dark. Sophie was sobbing, with her 
cheek pressed to his. 

Papa was sorry, I know. He didn’t mean to 
do it.” 

John’s teeth were set hard together. 

“ But she is well, she is happy,” he tried to say. 

“ Oh, yes ! I couldn’t wish anything happier 
for her. I am so glad it didn’t hurt her and kill 
her, — that she could be happy again. If it weren’t 
for papa ! ” 

Who told you ? ” 

“ Her husband,” said Sophie, bringing herself 
upright. ‘‘He didn’t know until I told him. O 
John, Cornelius Arnold, whom you admire so much, 
is Anna Ryder’s husband.” 

She turned and wound both arms about him, 
drawing his face down into her neck. 

“ Last night, while you were reading to poor Dr. 
Ennis in the parlor, I was walking up and down 
on the grass, all along the front of the house, with 
him, and he began to tell me about his wife, and 
called her Nancy » I said that was an old-fashioned 
name, and he said her name was Anna, and he 
began by calling her Nan, and then it lengthened 


228 


SECOND BEST, 


into Nancy. I said I had a friend once named 
Anna Ryder. And then he was so startled, and 
shocked, too, I think, and said he had no idea we 
were friends of his wife.” 

“ Did she deceive him so ? ” asked John, in a 
hoarse, muffled voice. 

“ Oh, no, no, indeed ! ” cried Sophie, anxiously. 

She told him all about us, — aZZ, every bit ; but 
she did not speak our names once, he said. I sup- 
pose she could not : it was too hard. But, Johnny, 
dear, if she is happy, and I know she must be with 
such a good man, aren’t you glad for her? You 
know she couldn’t help it.” 

I know,” said John, pushing her gently away 
from him as he arose. ‘‘ You may tell Leila. I 
want her to know all about us.” 

They watched him striding across the field to 
the house, and then the yellow head nestled on 
Leila’s shoulder, while “ all about us ” was tear- 
fully and eagerly told. 

“ You know nobody could help it,” she began. 

‘‘But Somebody takes care of what nobody can 
help,” Leila thought. She was glad for the woman 
who was the wife of Cornelius Arnold. What 
beautiful endings God could make to love-stories ! 


THREE STORIES. 


229 


Papa is away now, making money, and grow- 
ing harder and harder,” said Sophie. ‘‘ He says it 
is for me ; but I would rather have him. I don’t 
know where to begin. I’ll begin with the night he 
went across the street with me to hear her play.” 

Leila listened as she had never listened to a 
story before. She forgot the father: her whole 
soul was with the boy, J ohn, and the girl, like her, 
who had lived through a sorrowful story with a 
happy ending. 

Mr. Arnold said he would go away, — he does 
not want John to be troubled with seeing him. 
And John admires him so. And he has helped 
John. John says he threw a strong arm about 
him when he was struggling to get to land. Anna 
will be so glad to know he is getting back to be like 
himself, so gentle and gentlemanly. Papa said I 
must expect to find him like an Indian. Papa 
never understood John. Leila,” in a tone at once 
comical and despairing, “ it’s real hard to have a 
father and a brother at the same time.” 

Not quite as hard as to have neither at the 
same time,” said Leila, choking her own tears 
back, and in the consciousness of Sophie’s wealth 
of love feeling her own poverty. 


230 


SECOND BEST. 


‘‘ Oh, you poor dear ! Now I’ve hurt you. I 
have so much, I’ve always had so much of every- 
thing, that I’m spoiled. I wish you would go 
home and live, board, stay with us. Oh, what 
makes you so proud and dreadful? I don’t dare 
do anything, or say anything, or give you any- 
thing, or tell you anything,” — 

Leila’s merry laugh not only interrupted the 
half-tearful harangue, but brought John back to 
stone wall and companionship. What was the use 
of going off by himself, to hate his father, and to 
hate Arnold, and not forgive Anna Ryder, and 
make himself miserable, when there was Sophie’s 
loving heart to help him through, and a merry, 
wise girl like this strange Leila Provost to make 
life interesting ? He did not love to be miserable, 
and Anna Ryder was happy, and his father, poor 
father, he thought, forgiving him, and loving him, 
and understanding him for the first time in his 
life, as one man understands another. How did 
he know that he would not have done that thing 
his father did? And what other thing could 
Anna Ryder do but marry some one else? 

Would he have had her go mourning all her 
days because of himself and his father? With a 


THREE STORIES. 


231 


lighter heart, he trod the grass again, and made a 
place for himself beside his sister. Sophie dared 
not look at him. 

‘‘Life is all queer and mysterious and tangled 
up, anyway,” he burst out. “ What is the good 
of being selfish, anyway, and not be glad when 
other folks are happy ? Will you two girls go 
with me to Portland on the ‘Alice’ to-morrow? 
We’ll drive all over the city, and go to Cape Eliz- 
abeth, and see the light-house, and do everything 
anybody can think of.” 

“ Yes, indeed ! ” cried Sophie, delightedly. 
“You will go, won’t you, Leila?” 

“ No,” said Leila. 

“ I knew you wouldn’t,” grumbled John, disap- 
pointedly. “You never will go anywhere or do 
anything we ask you to ! I wish your pride would 
choke you half to death.” 

“ It does,” laughed Leila. 

“What are you proud about?” asked Sophie, 
innocently. 

“ She’s ashamed to be seen with us,” answered 
John. 

Are you ashamed of anything?” inquired 
Sophie, with a pretty wistfulness. 


232 


SECOND BEST. 


‘•‘Yes, I am ashamed of myself,” said Leila, in 
the tone of one of John’s bursts. “ I hate to be 
under obligation to anybody.” 

That’s your pride and selfishness,” remarked 
John, coolly. 

Leila, you don’t mind him ! ” consoled Sophie. 
“ He always rails at people, and at himself, too.” 

“ I mind, because it is true,” answered Leila. 

“ Rachel isn’t proud,” said Sophie. 

Leila understood : she was classing them to- 
gether because both were poor. Her cheeks 
burned, something swelled in her throat : she was 
ashamed of being poor.” 

And Christ was poor. 

Was she so ashamed that she would tell them 
she was as rich as they were? If their father 
should die, Sophie’s income might not be half her 
own ; and their father was only a business man, 
while hers was educated and literary and the 
Secretary of . 

“Rachel is — well-balanced,” John was about 
to say, but checked himself in a breath, and 
changed it into “ the best proportioned girl I ever 
saw.” 

“ I don’t know what you mean,” said Sophie, 
knitting her yellow eyebrows. 


THREE STORIES. 


233 


“ I will tell you,” cried Leila, springing to her 
feet and standing before them, dropping her golden 
treasure on the grass. ‘‘ Truth and openness are 
always best; and, if you praise me for doing a 
hard thing when I am doing it grudgingly and 
rebelliously, I cannot help it. I am not poor; I 
am quite rich. When I was eighteen, I had money 
from my mother, and papa left me something be- 
sides ; but money was not good for me, papa said : 
it made me selfish and narrow and luxury-loving, 
and kept down good things that should have room 
to grow in me, and I wasn’t half the woman he 
wanted me to be. Not long before he died he told 
me what he saw that I lacked, and he thought he 
had a plan to develop better things in me. He 
wanted me to be like Rachel Ennis, independent 
of gold and silver, and to be a useful woman with- 
out it.” 

“ And so he took your money away ! ” inter- 
rupted compassionate Sophie. 

‘‘No: he could not do that; he would not. He 
asked me to take it away from myself, and be poor, 
and live hard and plain, and work, and read books 
new to me, and know people uncongenial.” 

“ And are you doing it yourself? ” inquired 


234 


SECOND BEST. 


Sophie, in amazement, — ‘‘ dressing so plainly, and 
having no money to go anywhere,” — 

‘‘ And no books, and no plans for the winter,” 
interrupted John. ‘‘ Well, you are a brave little 
thing ! ” 

‘‘ I told you I was not brave. I began this life 
at home, before papa went away, and tried to bring 
myself to it gradually; but I miss everything I 
ever loved to do or have, and the sea and the walks 
and our good times do not half console me, 
because I could have all this and not be poor. I 
should revel in it for a little while, as you do, if I 
might go home this winter, — oh, how I dread the 
winter ! — and have my friends about me in my 
own home, or go to Europe, and travel with my 
aunt. I left everything home. I tried to dress as 
plainly as I knew how, and I write letters on 
cheap paper. Oh, I do try to do things I never 
did before ! And sometimes 1 am angry and hard 
and always rebellious. Papa’s plan isn’t working. 
I am not growing well-proportioned, like Rachel 
Ennis.” 

But she wouldn’t know how to be rich,” com- 
forted Sophie, in her sweet voice. 

“ She would learn easily. I would like to take 


THREE STORIES. 


235 


her home with me, and let her be rich awhile,” 
said Leila, dropping down on her shawl again. 
“Now you know about me,” with a long breath of 
relief. 

“I know you are brave,” said John, admiringly. 

“I told you you wouldn’t understand,” Leila 
exclaimed, impatiently. “I can only spend one 
dollar a day, and you can understand, after my 
board and laundry bill are paid, how little I have 
left. I don’t see how I can get winter dresses. I 
don’t see how people can be poor, and look as well 
as they do, and have what they do have, and go 
anywhere, and have time to study.” 

“Who said they did?” inquired John. “One 
dollar a day is poor fare.” 

“ How long must you be poor ? ” Sophie asked, 
anxiously. “ I don’t see why you can’t come and 
live with us and have things.” 

“ That would be depths of poverty, indeed, little 
sister,” said John, pinching her cheek. 

“ And then she could have her dollar for other 
things,” planned Sophie. 

“ There is no mu%t about it,” Leila acknowl- 
edged. “Papa exacted no promise, but I know 
his will : it was to be three years.” 


236 


SECOND BEST, 


Sophie’s echoed ‘‘ Three years ! ” was the very 
essence of dismay. 

“I think you are old enough to judge of the 
effect upon yourself,” said John; ‘‘but I must say, 
if you will kindly allow me, that you grow in 
physical strength every day. Your color is as 
pretty as Sophie’s, and you carry yourself — excuse 
the criticism” — 

“And my hands don’t quite resemble bird’s 
claws as closely as they did,” remarked Leila, with 
a laugh. “ I do feel stronger, and I look like an- 
other girl. Early hours and out-of-doors and no 
long hours of study are making me look as papa 
used to wish I looked.” 

“And I don’t see,” exclaimed John, angrily, 
“ why you can’t obey the rules of health, and cul- 
tivate that weedy garden of your womanhood, on 
five dollars a day as really as on one.” 

“ But I loved luxuries so ! I was ease-loving, 
lazy. I gave money instead of myself. I was 
growing more proud and selfish all the time. I 
cared for nothing but literary people and study, 
and travel for the culture it gave me, — don’t you 
see what I was ? ” 

“ I don’t like that kind of a girl,” admitted 
Sophie. “ I’ve seen many of them.” 


THREE STORIES. 


237 


‘‘They grow on lots of bushes,” said John. 
“If you had literary tastes and plenty of brain, 
you would be that kind yourself.” 

“Money wouldn’t hurt me if I weren’t proud 
and selfish already,” sighed Leila. “ It isn’t the 
money, its me.” 

“ Get rid of yourself instead of the money,” ad- 
vised John. “You are so little you could throw 
yourself in the sea and never be missed on land.” 

“ Shall you stay here all winter ? ” asked Sophie. 

“ I do not know what I shall do ! If I felt hound., 
it would be unbearable. I confess, it has been 
easier because you have been here. Rachel is 
always busy : I cannot have her. I am tired of 
the place already : it makes me tired to think I 
must be imprisoned here all winter.” 

“I should think you would exclaimed 

Sophie. 

“ She will : she will fly South,” said John. 

“ Do not be too sure. I know I should not be 
happy not doing as papa wished.” 

“But do you mean to say that a girl cannot be- 
come a perfect woman if she is rich?” demanded 
John, heatedly. 

“All girls are not like me. Papa saw how I 


238 


SECOND BEST. 


had let money weaken me. He thought it safer 
for me to do without it.” 

“ What you do without it is what puzzles me,” 
said John. “ Aren’t you idle now? What are you 
doing for anybody? What are you doing for 
yourself? ” 

Out of sheer conviction of the truth of his 
charge she could not speak. Had she ever been 
so idle in her life before ? She could be poor ; but 
she could not be poor and do. And it was the 
doing and growing on which her father had in- 
sisted. 

No money was nothing in itself; having money 
was nothing in itself. Somebody had written, 
and she had learned its faithfulness to life : 

There is no happiness in an idle woman. It 
may be with the hand, it may be with the brain, it 
may be with the foot ; but work she must, or be 
wretched.” 

It was not lack of money, therefore, but lack of 
work that was making her miserable, if miserable 
she were, now that she stood in her true position, 
in the eyes of somebody she admired, and had made 
two people she cared for her fast friends. 

“ Must we keep it a secret ? ” Sophie asked. 


THREE STORIES. 


239 


“ Of course,” said John. 

‘‘I would rather Rachel did not know yet,” 
returned Leila, “ especially if I stay with her all 
winter and — learn to work.” 

,“Now will you go to Portland with us?” asked 
John, “ and be rid of your ridiculous pride ? ” 

‘^If I have money to pay my fare,” promised 
Leila, mischievously. 

“ Shall I get a book and read to you ? ” he asked. 
“ Sophie has lots of trash.” 

‘‘I am reading geology,” laughed Leila. “I 
believe I shall be in love with it before I am 
through.” 

^‘Andl am reading medicine,” said John. ‘‘I 
found a heap of dusty old medical magazines, and 
offered to read them to the poor old doctor ; and 
his delight in me and talk afterward have shown 
me an unexplored vein in the mine of John Oster- 
moor that may be worth working. What would 
father say, Sophie, if I should ask him not to put 
me in the office, but send me through a medical 
course ? ” 

“I don’t know,” answered Sophie. ‘‘I don’t 
want him to be disappointed about anything. He 
has got to bear this about Anna.” 


240 


SECOND BEST, 


“ He deserves to,” growled John, between his 
teeth; and then he turned to Leila. “I say, 
Leila, I’ve got a place to take you to. I’ve been 
cruising around among the islands, and on one, 
about the size of a good sized pan-cake, live a man 
and his wife and three or four daughters. He 
never lets them leave the island summer or winter, 
and acts like a savage if anybody attempts to visit 
them. What do you suppose their life is like? 
Do you think they are bound to obey him ? ” 
They would feel lost in the world,” said Leila. 

“With all reverence for your father, I think you 
are bound to do what you think right yourself.” 

“ That’s the hardest thing in the world. I think 
that is partly what vexes me, that I do not know 
myself. It does not seem quite like a question of 
right and wrong. To judge righteous judgment is 
too hard for me.” 

She was not given to speaking the words of 
Christ, whether from shyness, or because they were 
too precious for her lips ; but she remembered that 
he said, “ My judgment is just, because I seek not 
mine own will.” 

“ Will you let me take you to that old fellow’s 
island?” 


THREE STORIES. 


241 


‘‘ I don’t want to be treated like a savage,” de- 
murred Sophie. 

‘‘I haven’t told you all,” said Leila, ready to 
laugh and ready to cry. My father met your 
father once in London : they were a kind of 
cousins, and my great-grandmother was named — 
Ostermoor.” 

Before the name had left her lips, Leila felt two 
arms close about her, and John Ostermoor’s lips 
were on her cheeks and brow. 

‘‘Now, if you are ever shabby to me again. I’ll 
know the reason why. I’ve taken you under my 
wing, and, if you don’t find all the love and pro- 
tection you want, may I go cold and hungry ! ” 

And then, frightened, indignant, and wholly 
relieved and glad, Leila burst into tears. 

“You must go to Australia,” said John, still 
keeping his arm about her ; “ and that is what 
your father meant. Everything there has turned 
around the other way. When it is winter in 
America, it is summer there. The swans are 
black, the trees shed their bark instead of their 
leaves, the stone is on the outside of the fruit, 
there is a kind of fly that kills and eats the spider, 
and the climbing perch solemnly walks up out of 


242 


SECOND BEST. 


the water, and uses its fins to climb the nearest 
tree.” 

“No,” declared Leila, having come to the mo- 
ment of decision toward which she had been striv- 
ing since the hour in which her father had shown 
her to herself : “ I shall stay here and do some- 
thing. I care very much to be different ; and you 
don’t know how it hurts to put that into words. 
I believe every drop of blood in me is proud blood, 
and yet I hate pride in other people.” 

She had drawn herself suddenly away from his 
arm. What right had he, cousin as he was, to put 
his arms about her ? 

“ Ostermoor blood is ten times thicker than 
water,” laughed John, “and the bad in it is very 
solid.” 

At that momenjb Rachel appeared in the door- 
way of the shed, and beckoned. 

John hastened toward her; the others followed 
slowly. 

“It’s only letters,” said Sophie. “I see them in 
her hand.” 

“ I wish letters meant everything to me as they 
do to you,” returned Leila. “Any letter may sum- 
mon you home, and no letter has a right to me.” 


THREE STORIES, 


243 


It was but one letter, written by her aunt to 
Sophie : ‘‘ Your father has come home unex- 

pectedly. He does not seeiij like himself. I wish 
you would come home. He asked where Johp 
was as if he had forgotten.” 

Sophie read it aloud, with John looking over 
her shoulder. 

‘‘ Will you go, John ? ” she asked. 

“ To-morrow, if you wish. Why didn’t he write 
himself, I wonder.” 

‘‘And you will not talk about being a doctor, 
or anything else, will you?” she urged eagerly. 

“ Father can’t expect to cut me out by a pattern 
he has made himself.” 

“ But, John, he isn’t like himself ^ 

“ The best news I’ve heard for some time,” mut- 
tered John, under his breath. 

“ You are cross to-day. He has got to hear 
about Anna, as well as you ; only I shall never 
dare tell him. Will you go home and be good?” 
she pleaded, winding both arms about his neck. 

“Yes,” said John. 

And she knew he would keep his word; and 
she would never know how much it cost liim to 
do it. 


244 


SECOND BEST 


“‘No one unable to endure hardships “In His 
Name” need apply’ to be my father’s son,” he mut- 
tered, catching her up in his arms, and running 
around the house with her. 

“ Leila, we are going to-morrow,” he announced 
to the girl he ran against with his laughing, strug- 
gling burden. “Father has come home, and is 
pining for me.” 


XIV. 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 

“ Men and women make 
The world, as head and heart make human life. 

Work man, work woman, since there’s work to do 
In this beleaguered earth, for head and heart. 

And thought can never do the work of love.” 

“ God made her so. 

And deeds of week-day holiness 
Fell gently from her as the snow ; 

Nor had she ever chanced to know 
That aught was easier than to bless.” 

It would be September to-morrow; • why 
shouldn’t they go home? Sophie was glad to 
go to her father; but she had been forgetting 
she was going home, she had been having such 
a good time. She had never had this kind of a 
good time before. She had found John, and that 
was finding a whole world. And that was not 
half : she had found how to go on, step by step, 
learning beautiful, true things about God. 

She had not told John. 

That last night she said to Rachel that she 
would not know how to read the Bible by herself : 


246 


SECOND BEST 


it would seem like a hook when she was alone with 
herself. Now it was not a book at all, but God, 
and Christ, and real people, and things to do. 
Every evening, in Rachel’s room or her own, the 
two had read together. 

will show you something that has helped 
me,” Rachel said, bringing the small, thick book 
that was always open on her bureau. “In this 
b(K)k is a page for every morning in the year, and 
one for every evening. They are all verses from 
the Bible. The one at the top is in larger print, 
and the others explain the top one, or bring out 
some new meaning. At the foot of the page are 
the references, so you can find each verse and read 
all the rest of it. I learn one or two always when 
I am dressing and undressing. This one you will 
like,” turning the leaves backward. “ The date is 
March 8, in the morning.” 

“ ‘ Thou hast cast all my sins behind thy 
BACK,’ ” read Sophie. 

Rachel had di^awn a pencil line under the word 
“my.” 

Then Sophie read aloud the finer print : — 

“ ‘ Who is a God like unto thee that pardoneth 
iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the 


THE NIGHT BEFORE, 


247 


remnant of his heritage? He retaineth not his 
anger forever, because he delighteth in mercy. He 
Avill turn again ; he will have compassion upon us ; 
he will subdue our iniquities ; and thou wilt cast 
all their sins into the depths of the sea. 

“ ‘ I will forgive their iniquity, and I will re- 
member their sin no more. 

‘‘ ‘ For a small moment have I forsaken thee ; 
but with great mercies will I gather thee. In a 
little wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment ; 
but with everlasting kindness will I have mercy on 
thee, saith the Lord, the Redeemer. 

‘ Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven ; 
whose sin is covered. 

‘ Blessed is the man to whom the Lord imput- 
eth not iniquity, and in Avhose spirit there is no 
guile. 

“ ‘ The blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, cleanseth 
us from all sin.’ 

Oh, how lovely all that is ! ” said Sophie, with 
a sigh of content. I like to have it all together. 
And the last is best of all. Now I will find them 
all, and read every bit of it. Where can I get a 
book like this?” 

Rachel turned to the title page. 


248 


SECOND BEST, 


‘‘ Oh, I see. I’ll ask John to get me one as soon 
as I get home. I wish papa would care for it.” 

“ If you read this every day, and the Bible be- 
sides, as we have been doing” — 

Oh, I shall. I should miss it so. But I shall 
miss you,, Rachel. Where can I find somebody like 
you ? ” she asked, earnestly. 

‘‘You dear little goose ! ” laughed Rachel. 

“ Will you write to me ? That will help.” 

“ Oh, thank you. I shall love to. Will you 
ask me questions and tell me all about yourself as 
you do now ? ” 

“ I don’t know how to write as I talk, but I’ll 
try. Somebody must help me. I found something 
to-day that is like you and me. I don’t know 
where it is now, but it was like this : if anybody 
turned anybody to righteousness, they should 
shine like the stars, forever and ever. I want you 
to shine like a star forever and ever, for being so 
lovely to me.” 

Rachel’s eyes were full of tears. And God had 
given to her such joy as this ! 

She was glad that Mint called her just then. 
He said grandmother was getting cross waiting 
for her farina, and Delia was coaxing father to let 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


249 


her do something, and wouldn’t make it for her. As 
she stood over the stove in the shed, stirring the 
farina, she remembered a leaflet of two leaves that 
Anna Ryder had enclosed to her in the only letter 
she ever wrote her. The leaflet was among her 
few treasures. It was the very thing to give this 
dear little Sophie as a parting gift : it would tell 
her so much better than she could — for it was not 
easy for her to speak of such things — all she 
wished to tell her to do. 

“Is there cream on it? ” asked the grandmother, 
grumblingly, as Rachel brought the yellow bowl. 

“ Cream, granny ! Is there gold dust sprinkled 
over it? With only one cow, and two little ladies 
to cover with cream, how can I have it every 
night?” 

“ You might think of me first. But you always 
think of somebody else first.” 

The bony fingers were eagerly outstretched 
toward the bowl. 

“ Granny, did you ever hear of a king,” Rachel 
began merrily, putting the first taste of the farina 
to her lips, “ who was so rich that he had himself 
gilded with gold dust every day ? Long ago 
people in Europe believed that, and rushed to 


250 


SECOND BEST, 


Brazil, to find him and his gold. Mustn’t he have 
been a big, ugly, yellow thing ? ” 

‘‘ Did it get into his eyes and mouth ? ” queried 
the interested voice. 

‘‘It wasn’t as good as farina, was it? Now, I 
must go upstairs again, and then I'll come and put 
you in your little bed.” 

“I am glad they’re going,” sputtered grand- 
mother. 

Reproachful words rushed to the girl’s lips. 
The grocer’s bill was only half paid yet ; for Delia 
had insisted upon having five dollars for her share, 
to buy a sun umbrella, with a gold handle, like 
Miss Sophie’s, and had coaxed her father to compel 
Rachel to give it to her, saying she had earned it, 
and Rachel was not fair to her. If they would only 
stay through September, then she could pay the 
balance, and get a pair of blankets for her grand- 
mother’s winter nights. 

“ You needn’t look so angry,” exclaimed the old 
woman, feeling the sudden fierceness in the girl’s 
face and still manner. 

“ I am angry,” Rachel burst out, “ I am so an- 
gry I am wicked. I don’t love people, I hate 
people when I am so angry.” 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


251 


Standing on the grass outside the door, Leila 
heard the passionate words. She turned and has- 
tened away. The stars were shining over the water. 
It was lonesome down on the rocks, and she wanted 
to be lonesome. The whole world was a lonesome 
place to-night. Sophie had her brother and her 
father and Rachel Ennis. Rachel Ennis loved 
Sophie : she had not taken to her. And yet she 
must stay and live her hard life. She had to live 
her hard life somewhere. 

‘‘ I wish this was a happy world,” she sighed. 

The leaflet Rachel laid in Sophie’s hand would 
have brought blessed comfort to the girl speeding 
away to the rocks ; but Rachel did not think of 
Miss Leila as needing anything : she seemed to be 
everything to herself, and in herself. 

Let me read it aloud,” said Sophie, in her 
childish voice : “ that is like somebody speaking.” 

I think you will care more for it if you know 
how it came to me. A lady, a girl, — for she was 
more like a girl, — boarded at the Greys’ one sum- 
mer, and used to come over here two or three times 
a day. She would have come to board, but she was 
afraid of hurting Mrs. Grey. She was in trouble 
when she came, and did not know how to get com- 


252 


SECOND BEST, 


forted. Some people don’t. 'But it came after 
awhile. I don’t know how, but I felt it coming. 
After she went away, she wrote once to me, and 
sent me this leaflet, and told me it had been a 
great deal to her. She did not ask me to write, or 
give me her address, so I could never tell her how 
I loved it.” 

“ What was her name ? ” 

“ Miss Ryder, Anna Ryder.” 

“ Was it my Anna Ryder ? ” cried Sophie. “ Did 
you find her when we lost her? ” 

And then Sophie poured out her long story, the 
story of her childhood, but not the story of the 
ending ; and Rachel was puzzled that Miss Ryder 
should go away and not let Sophie know where 
she had gone. She seemed so frank, there could 
not be any mystery about her; and yet, it was 
very queer, and she said so, and then was sorry, . 
Sophie looked so troubled. 

“ She is Mr. Arnold’s wife now, and is in Ger- 
many, a kind of companion and governess, some- 
thing like one of those advertisements, I suppose. 
Perhaps she advertised,” Sophie brought herself to 
answer quietly. ‘‘ I am glad to have this. I am 
so glad she was comforted, for she left us, or we 
left her, in great trouble.” 


THE NIGHT BEFORE, 


253 


With a quick little motion Sophie lifted the leaf- 
let to her lips. She began to read in a voice with 
tears in it : — • 

“ ‘ My child, it is not necessary to know much to 
please me : it is sufficient to love much. Speak to 
me as thou wouldst to a mother if she drew thee 
near to her. 

“ ‘ Are there any for whom thou wouldst pray 
to me ? Repeat to me the names of thy relations, 
thy friends; after each name add what thou 
wouldst have me do for them. Ask much. Ask 
much. I love generous souls who forget them- 
selves for others. 

‘‘ ‘ Tell me of the poor whom thou wouldst relieve, 
the sick whom thou hast seen suffer, the sinners 
thou wouldst have converted, those who are alien- 
ated from thee, whose affections thou wouldst 
regain. For all say a fervent prayer. Remember 
that I have promised to hear all prayers that 
come from the heart ; and is not that a prayer 
from the heart which is offered for those we love 
and who love us ? ’ Oh, fs that true ? ” Sophie ques- 
tioned. Has He promised that ? I have every- 
thing to ask for papa and John.” 

‘‘He has promised that, if we ask anything 


254 


SECOND BEST, 


according to His will, He heareth us,” returned 
Rachel. 

Oh, I don’t want anything for them that is 
not His will,” said Sophie, in perfect content. 
^‘That is the best, best thing. I pray every day 
the prayer you gave me, — ‘ Make me willing and 
obedient,’ — and I love it. 

What would Sophie think of her if she knew 
how wickedly angry she had been downstairs not 
fifteen minutes ago, with her father and Delia and 
her grandmother ? Had she been willing and obe- 
dient? And the money ivas her father’s, and 
Delia had tried to do her best, and her grand- 
motli^r was nothing but an old baby, and couldn’t 
understand. 

‘‘You must not think I am — that. I am not. 
I do not wish to seem so to you, when I am not. 
I have fights inside of me.” 

“ Do you ? ” asked Sophie, incredulously. “ I 
never saw you wicked.” 

“I wish I would show it, then. I don’t like 
people to think I am always submissive. I say 
hard things to poor father, and I am tyrannical to 
Delia and hateful to grandmother and cross to 
Mint. I even shook him yesterday, I was so angry 
when he refused to do errands.” 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


255 


“ I should think you would,” said Sophie, sym- 
pathetically. “ J ohn says he can hardly keep his 
hands off him. I am glad you are bad sometimes. 
I was afraid you were always good. Now t}ii% is 
for us ! Why, every word is for us ! ^ Are there 

graces thou wouldst ask for thyself? Write, if 
thou wilt, a long list of all thou desirest, of all the 
needs of thy soul, and read it to me. 

“ ‘ Tell me simply how proud thou art, how sen- 
sitive, egotistical, mean, and indolent ; and ask me 
to come and help thee in all the efforts thou mak- 
est against it. Poor child, do not blush : there are 
in heaven many saints who had thy faults. They 
prayed to me, and little by little their faults were 
corrected. 

“‘Do not hesitate to ask me for blessings for 
the body and mind, for health, memory, success. I 
can give all things, and I always give when bless- 
ings are needed to render souls more holy.’ Is 
that what all blessings are for, — to make us holy? ” 
asked Sophie. “ Is that what I have everything 
for ? I ought to be very good, with so many bless- 
ings. I am sorry I have so much more than you 
have.” 

Rachel hesitated, then confessed. “ I was envi- 


256 


SECOND BEST. 


ous when you first came. My things seemed 
second best beside yours. I thought I had always 
had second-best things. Nothing that belongs to 
me seems first best, or the things I do. That is 
my bad mood. But it is not second best to have 
you say what you said about shining forever.” 

Rachel spoke huskily and nervously, and Sophie 
gave her arm an affectionate squeeze. 

“‘To-day what wilt thou have, my child? If 
thou knowest how I long to do thee good. Hast 
thou plans that occupy thee ? Lay them all before 
me. Do they concern thy vocation ? ’ I haven’t 
any vocation. That sounds so French, doesn’t it? 
But I must have one. What do you think mine 
should be?” 

“ I think you have one. Vocation is a calling, 
isn’t it? I think a home, with a father and a 
brother in it, and money to help people, and time 
to study the Bible, — and it is such a hig study, 
you don’t know half, — and plans to do good to 
people you meet, — and you meet so many people, 
— is vocation enough for one girl. There’s always 
something new coming to do and to think about. 
I am full of plans.” 

Sophie’s eyes were very earnest : she had been 


THE NIGHT BEFORE, 


257 


such an idle girl before she knew Rachel Ennis. 
She read on, with a sigh of pleasure: — 

“ ‘ What dost thou desire ? Dost thou wish to 
give pleasure to thy mother, to thy family, to those 
on whom thou dost depend ? What wouldst thou 
do for them ? 

“ ‘ And for Me — hast thou no zealous thought 
for Me ? Dost thou not wish to do a little good 
to the souls of thy friends whom thou lovest, and 
who have perhaps forgotten me ? Tell me in 
whom thou art interested, what motives move 
thee, what means thou wouldst employ. Whom 
dost thou wish interested in thy work ? I am 
Master of hearts, my child, and lead them where I 
will. I will bring round thee all who will be nec- 
essary to thee.’ Does that mean friends, people, 
anybody?” 

“Why not? He brings people together. He 
knows the people who need each other.” 

“To make us holy? Does He think about that 
all the time ? I like to have Him think to make 
us happy, too. Don’t you long to be happy? ” 

“ I think I am — almost always. I have so 
much to work for.” 

“ And you don’t long to have things changed ? 


258 


SECOND BEST, 


I don’t believe you are like girls who wish to be 
married.” 

Rachel laughed at the fervent tone, then replied, 
seriously : “ No, I am not like girls in that. I am 
married already — to father and grandmother and 
Delia and Mint. I never had time to be like girls 
in that. And I never saw any one, — that makes 
a difference, you know. I am a ‘maiden lady,’ 
already,” she added, with a merry laugh. “ Aren’t 
they two beautiful things to be ? ” 

“ But you are not old^ 

“ Oh, that kind never grows old : a maiden is 
always young.” 

The leaflet fluttered, then Sophie read : “ ‘ Bring 
me all thy failures, and I will show thee the cause 
of them. Hast thou not troubles? O my child, 
tell them all to me, fully. Who has caused thee 
pain ? Tell me all, and thou wilt finish by adding 
that thou wilt pardon, thou wilt forget ; and I will 
bless thee. 

“ ‘ Dost thou dread something painful ? Is there 
in thy heart a vain fear which is not reasonable, 
but which is tormenting? Trust thyself wholly 
to my care. I am here. I see everything. I will 
not leave thee. Are there those near thee who 


THE NIGHT BEFORE, 


259 


seem less kind to thee than they have been, and 
whose indifference and neglect separate thee from 
them ’ — did she put that faint pencil line, or did 
you ? ” Sophie asked, quickly. 

I did not.” 

Then ^he did. Oh, I can’t tell you how we 
hurt her, all of us. I was little ; I couldn’t under- 
stand. And I can’t write to her now. Papa 
wouldn’t like it. But I can send a message 
through Mr. Arnold. But just see this : this isn’t 
marked. Perhaps she did not wish to bring us 
back.” 

Sophie read eagerly : " Pray earnestly to me 

for them, and I Avill bring them back to thee, if 
they are needed for thy life’s sanctification.’ Yes, 
that is always it,” she added discontentedly ; ‘‘ but 
I want happiness as well as sanctification. Why 
doesn’t it say happiness ? Is it always sanctifica- 
tion in the Bible, instead of happiness ? ” 

I think it always means sanctification,” Rachel 
answered, cautiously. ‘‘We have to be made holy, 
to be taken to heaven.” 

“ Perhaps it hurts to be made holy.” 

“ I am sure it does.” 

“But I don’t want to be hurt,” said Sophie, 
petulantly. 


260 


SECOND BEST, 


“You will be glad to be hurt when it’s over. 
And we are happy, too. Aren’t you happy to- 
night?” 

“ Almost. If I were not afraid of — sanctifica- 
tion.” 

Sophie’s tone was doleful, and Eachel’s merry 
laugh that greeted it was heard downstairs. It was 
very comical to her to be afraid of sanctification. In 
a disturbed voice, Sophie began to read again : — 

“ ‘ Hast thou not joys to make known to me ? 
Why dost thou not let me share thy happiness? 
Tell me what has happened since yesterday to 
cheer and console thee. Was it an unexpected 
visit that did thee good, a fear suddenly dissipated, 
a success thou thoughtest thou shouldst not reach, 
a mark of affection, a letter, a gift, a trial which 
left thee stronger than thou supposed ? I have pre- 
pared it all for thee.’ There ! He does give us hap- 
piness, too,” Sophie cried, joyously. “ He has 
prepared it all for us. I do want a little bit of 
happiness as well as sanctification.” 

“ I think you have a big bit,” said Rachel, jeal- 
ously, thinking of Sophie’s brother, and the father 
of whom she said she was so proud. 

“ ‘ Thou canst show thy gratitude and give me 
thanks.’ ” 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


261 


In an instant Rachel was penitent and grateful. 
Would she exchange her poor, blind father for any 
father in the world ? 

“ ‘ Hast thou promises to make to me ? I can 
read the depths of thy heart. Thou knowest 
thou canst deceive men, but not God. Be thou 
sincere. 

‘ Art thou resolved no longer to expose thyself 
to this temptation ? To give up this object which 
leads thee to evil? Not to finish this book which 
excites thy imagination ? ’ Oh, dear,” groaned 
Sophie; ‘‘and I like novels. I read dozens and 
dozens. I believe if I had put all the paper cov- 
ered books in my trunk that I had ready to bring 
I shouldn’t have cared to study the Bible with you. 
I know I shouldn’t. I read everything because I 
don’t know what is good until I read the book 
through. John says I don’t know how to select. 
But he will select for me now. I’ve read the 
greatest amount of trash. I know now that it 
was trash. I promised papa I wouldn’t read 
French novels, and then he thought I was safe. 
What shall I do if I lose my taste for the Bible 
and such books — like this leaflet — after I get 
home ? ” she asked, in affright. 


262 


SECOND BEST, 


‘‘Do exactly what this asks you — not read 
books that come between. I have never had time. 
I have to read to father and grandmother, and I 
couldn’t read trash to them. You see that my 
life isn’t all second best.” 

With an audible sigh, Sophie took up the leaflet 
she had dropped in her lap. It had begun so de- 
lightfully, and now it was searching her through 
and through. 

“‘No longer to give thy friendship to a person 
who is not religious, and whose presence disturbs 
the peace of thy soul.’ Now I think that is hate- 
ful,” Sophie burst out. “ How can all my friends 
be religious ? ” 

“ But they need not be irreligious, and come be- 
tween — like the books,” said Rachel, quietly. 

“ You don’t know, — you don’t have such temp- 
tations,” said Sophie, in a superior tone. “ Did 
you ever give up anybody who came between ? ” 

“Yes,” replied Rachel, flushing, “I gave up a 
friendship once that I cared a great deal for.” 

“Was that the reason?” Sophie asked, in be- 
wildered surprise. “ I never heard of anything 
like it.” 

“ Yes, the only reason. He did not believe the 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


263 


Bible. He called me a Puritan, and said he ad- 
mired me for being one, but that was beautiful in 
a woman, and too childish for men. He came from 
Portland to see me. Father admired him. He 
brought me books ; but he came between, and I 
could not bear it, and told him so, and he has not 
come since. He was married last winter.” 

Sophie had not a word to say. This girl on the 
sea-coast had a knowledge of life that was beyond 
her. She read meekly : “ ‘ W ell, my child, go 
now, take up thy work, be silent, humble, submis- 
sive, kind, and come back to-morrow and bring me 
a heart still more devout and loving. To-morrow 
I shall have more blessings for thee.’” 

Sophie sat still. She felt silent, humble, sub- 
missive. How good God was, to have more bless- 
ings for her to-morrow, when she had been so bad 
to-day ! 

Rachel, I’m not good,” she said, at last. 

‘‘Who is?” 

“ I will keep this in my new Bible, and thank 
you so.” 

Rachel was not sure that she was glad that she 
had given it to her to keep : it was very precious 
to her. Anna Ryder would never give her another 


264 


SECOND BEST, 


thing. She wished Sophie would think of that, 
and refuse to take it ; but, then, it would help her 
remember. 

“I’m bad and selfish. And, now, good-night. 
You shall have your breakfast early. Can you 
think of anything special you would like to have?” 

“ Your dear little hot biscuit ! And those cakes, 
and I’d like chicken, and cream toast. You do 
make such delicious things.” 

Chicken and hot biscuit and cakes and toast! 
And perhaps Delia would be late. 

“ I’ll do my best,” said Rachel ; and in the twi- 
light Sophie did not see the frown that came and 
went. “ And I’ll try not to have it second best,” 
she said, with a laugh that was only half merry. 
But Mint had walked to the village with Luke 
Grey, and she must kill the chickens herself, and 
pick them. Perhaps she could cook them half to- 
night, then she would not have to rise so early in 
the morning. What did put chicken into the 
girl’s head ? She had no more idea of work than a 
chicken, herself. 

“ Anything else ? ” she asked, with a touch of 
sarcasm that passed over Sophie’s head. 

“ Oh, no, thank you. You are very good.” 


THE NIGHT BEFORE, 


265 


She was not very good. She was provoked. 
She was hoping Sophie cared for her, and how 
could she and not think ? Mint would not make 
the fire, and there was the milking, and the fire 
had to be kindled again, to boil water to scald the 
chickens. How wicked she must be to be so cross 
about a little thing ! Shine forever and ever.” 
Could any one like her shine — and forever and 
ever? — but she had tried! Before she knew it 
the unusual tears were coming: they fell faster 
and faster as she stooped over the chips in the 
wood-house, and her eyes were still reddened when 
Delia found her picking the chickens in the shed 
by the light of a small lamp. 

“ Chickens to-morrow,” she exclaimed, ‘‘ when 
nobody will be here I ” 

“ They are for breakfast,” said Rachel, shortly. 

‘‘ Well, you are getting extravagant I Mrs. Grey 
says you have fed your boarders too well, that you 
don’t know how to keep boarders.’ 

Delia sat down in a wooden chair at the end of 
the table, and leaned both elbows on the table. 
She did not notice the evidence of tears in her sis- 
ter’s face and voice. She was excited with good 
news about herself that burst out in a flow of 


266 


SECOND BEST. 


words that Rachel listened to without attempting 
to break. Once in a while she gave a twitch at 
the feathers that was not called for * but Delia was 
thinking of no one but herself. 

“ I’ve been thinking of it so long, and you never 
would care, or help me, or want me to go. But 
I brought father over : he could see that I must 
have money to be married with, if you wouldn’t, 
— cross old maid ! ” Delia pouted and laughed. 

And now Charlie’s sister has found the very 
place for me. This girl has boarded with her 
two years, right across the street from the 
store. It’s on Exchange Street. Why, you know 
it, Rache. You bought your satteen there. And 
she is going to be married, like me, to a first mate 
of a ship, like me, and Charlie’s sister says, — she 
has been home spending the day, and I’ve been 
over to see her, and that’s why I couldnt get home 
to help you this afternoon, and I’m real sorry, but 
I was so excited, she came home to tell me as 
much as anything, and she will take me for a 
dollar a week and my help early in the morning, — 
you needn’t lift your eyebrows ! I can get up in 
the morning, if I have to, — and evenings after I 
get home I can do something, and Sundays ; and 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


267 


this girl, Sarah Bradford, will stay a week longer 
in the store, and show me about things, and I can 
learn things in a minute. I’m so much quicker 
than you ! Charlie’s sister told Mr. Hayes — he’s 
one of the firm — that she had just the girl for him. 
And the only bother of it is that I must go to- 
morrow, before I am half fixed ; but I can take 
your new gingham that you’ve only worn twice, 
and the white apron Mrs. Ostermoor made you, 
and I’ll send you another dress as soon as I can 
save the money, only I do think I have earned that. 
Charlie will be home in April, if all goes Avell, and 
wedl be married as soon as I’m ready. I know 
you’ll miss me, and winter is awfully lonesome out 
here in the country ; but I’ll come home as often 
as I can afford it, and when you come to buy 
your winter things you can stay all night with me, 
and perhaps go to a concert or something. You 
can find somebody to take care of the house and 
grandmother. Mrs. Grey will : she’s always kind. 
Now, don’t look solemn and spoil everything. 
You didn’t like the factory, and you don’t like the 
store ! I don’t know why you should be so much 
prouder than I am.” 

Am i ? ” asked Rachel, speaking at last. 


268 


SECOND BEST. 


“ I don’t know what else it is,” said Delia, obsti- 
nately. 

I don’t like Mrs. Harris.” 

“ You don’t like Charlie, for that matter. Well, 
I don’t love Mrs. Harris, myself. She isn’t like 
you, full of queer notions about girls doing this 
and not doing that, and I can have a little freedom. 
It’s time I had, I am going to be married so soon. 
Now, you are crying and spoiling it all. I think 
you might be sensible and reasonable for once. I 
am going. It’s settled, and father says I may. 
I’m going to-morrow with Mrs. Harris. I hope 
you won’t be mean about the dress and apron.” 

I am glad to help you do a right thing.” 

“ A right thing ! I knew you’d talk like that. 
I am not going to sell liquor or break the Sabbath, 
am I ? ” Delia questioned, furiously. 

If you will stay home I will do all your sewing 
for you, and give you all I can. Miss Leila is not 
going yet; and, if she takes the parlor chamber, 
she will pay five dollars^ and I will not be ‘ extrav- 
agant,’ as you call it, after Miss Sophie goes, — 
she has such a way of ordering things, and Mr. 
Ostermoor has taken every meal here the last two 
weeks.” 


THE NIGHT BEFORE, 


269 


And paid for it.” 

‘‘ Certainly ; but I had to have things for him. 
I could not take their money and not give them a 
fair return.” 

Oh, you are always fair to everybody but your 
own people,” taunted Delia. ‘‘ Father says you 
haven’t saved enough out of the board money.” 

Not heeding her, for the taunt was nothing new, 
Rachel went on : ‘‘I will not get anything new for 
myself this winter, but a shawl, — I must keep 
from freezing when I go out ! And by April, if 
Miss Leila should stay all winter, I could have 
your things fixed for you as nicely as you can do 
yourself. The winter will be very long and lone- 
some, and Mint will go to school, and father and 
grandmother will be hard to amuse ” — 

Delia spoke impressively : I think you are very 
selfish, Rachel Ennis ! You don’t think how hard 
the winter will be for me. Charlie wants me to be 
with his sister in Portland, and not be such a 
country girl. He wrote me another letter from 
Liverpool about it, and I did not show you the 
letter, because you are mean about his letters and 
jealous of the influence he has over me. You 
make so much of his not being a church-member. 
Am I a church-member myself ? ” 


270 


SECOND BEST, 


‘‘ I do not mean merely a clmrch-member, you 
know I do not. He is not a Christian.” 

‘‘Well, am I?” asked Delia, with a convincing 
nod. “Is father? Is grandmother ? You are the 
only one in the house, and I don’t see liow you got 
to be one.” 

Rachel did not “ see,” but she knew. 

“ And I don’t want to be,” said Delia, deliberat- 
ingly, “ if it makes people disagreeable, and spoils 
other people’s good times. I shall go to Portland 
to-morrow. And if you won’t let me have your 
things I can go without.” 

Delia arose without looking at the head drop- 
ping lower and lower over the work in her hand. 
If there were tears, she did not wish to see them. 
She had been working hard to help Rachel keep 
these distracting boarders, and now she had her 
reward : Rachel wouldn’t pay her what she had 
earned, and was making a fuss about her doing 
something to relieve her father of the expense of 
fitting her out to be married. 

Mrs. Harris thought she was brave to leave 
home and go into a store, where she would have 
- to stand on her feet all day long, and be at every- 
body’s beck and nod. They liked pretty girls be- 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


271 


hind the counter, Mrs. Harris said, and she must 
keep herself looking as pretty as she could. 

‘‘You may have my dress. I shall have to take 
it off the skirt, and make it shorter, and take in the 
seams of the waist. You are slighter than I am.” 

“ Can you do it to-night ? ” asked Delia, half 
turning toward her, and twirling her straw hat in 
her fingers. 

“Yes.” 

“ I suppose I oughtn’t to ask for the satteen, in- 
stead,” suggested Delia, with a short laugh. 

“No.” 

“ Well, you are real good, anyway, if you are so 
cross about my going, and think Charlie Harris is 
horrid because he does things other young men do. 
He would be an old woman, and not manly, if he 
didn’t.” 

Delia crossed the shed, and entered the kitchen. 
Rachel called her: “Will you be down to make 
cream toast in the morning ? ” 

“ Dear me, no. Haven’t I got to pack my things 
in the morning ? I’m too tired to do any more to- 
night.” 

Then she came to the kitchen door, and said, in 
a low tone ; “ If I ask father for five dollars to 


272 


SECOND BEST, 


help me get a few things and pay my fare, don’t 
you tell him I don’t need it, for I 

Rachel would not speak, and she waited. 

‘‘ Say, Rache ! ” 

“ If father has given you permission to go, it’s 
too late for me to interfere ; but I would have 
hindered it if I could.” 

‘‘ I know you would,” laughed Delia. “ Did 
you think I wasn’t bright enough for that ? Good- 
night. You’ll be proud of me when you see me 
married in white silk with a veil.” 

Rachel worked with a resolute will : it was the 
only way to keep back the sorrowful and indignant 
tears. She was a cross old maid,” and Delia was 
young and pretty and spoiled, and had not had 
any mother, and her father had petted her, and she 
had not been a good sister. She had loved her 
and worked for her, but that had not changed her. 
She had not prayed half enough for her. She had 
asked her to read the leaflet she gave Sophie, and 
she had read it one stormy Sunday afternoon, and 
then said: ‘‘Well, what of it? It doesn’t mean 
much to me.” 

Delia did say her prayers every night. She 
flopped down on the carpet beside her bed, and 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


273 


buried her face two minutes in the bed-clothes, 
and then jumped up and talked about everything 
as if she hadn’t stopped talking. 

And, then, Rachel knew she herself was silly and 
selfish, but she did mind giving her that gingham 
dress. It was a Scotch gingham, in such soft 
pretty colors, and she had made it for herself, 
sewing at night when the house was asleep, and 
Sophie had told her it was a part of her, it was 
so like her, and now Delia must switch it out. 
She would never remember to send her gingham 
for another, and it would not be fine and pretty 
like this if she did! 

Oh, dear, it was so hard to be unselfish I She 
did not wish to be unselfish : she would rather 
keep the dress and be selfish. She remembered 
the prayer of St. Augustine : “ Make me holy, 
but not yety 

And she did pray to be made unselfish, — but 
not yet. 

It would be nothing to give away something she 
did not care for ; but this was a tug at her selfish 
heart. She did love to look pretty once in a 
while. Delia looked pretty all the time, in any- 
thing. 


274 


SECOND BEST, 


‘‘I am like other girls,” her heart cried out, 
and I do care, and I want things I can’t have.” 
She could never own anything, in the sense of 
having it to herself : everybody in the house shared 
her few possessions. 

The chickens were picked and singed and cut 
up and put over the chip fire to stew, and then she 
brought the gingham dress down to the kitchen, to 
rip and fix over. It was not late, not more than 
eight o’clock. Standing in the doorway in the 
starlight, she could not see the two figures on the 
pier, — tall John Ostermoor and a small somebody 
that must be Miss Leila, — hut she knew they were 
there. 

How bright and comical these two were to- 
gether, and what fun they had talking to each 
other! She’ wondered if she cared that he was 
going. She and this proud little lady would be 
thrown more together. She had been disappointed 
in Miss Leila, in one way : she Avas reserved and 
far off ; she could never talk to her as she had to 
Sophie. 

And then she went back to the table, and sewed 
for an hour. During that hour the two on the 
pier were talking in their rapid way, and saying a 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


275 


great deal to each other ; for was it not their last 
talk for a long, long while ? It began by his ask- 
ing her if she had a decided purpose for the winter. 

“ My purpose is to behave myself,” she an- 
swered, lightly ; ‘‘ and my plan is not quite so well 
resolved. I shall stay here and learn things ; not 
learn about things. Papa said that was one of my 
great difficulties. He said I learned about so many 
things, and knew so few things ; that I studied 
about the Bible instead of the Bible. So I’ve 
given uj) for a while every Bible study but the 
Bible itself ; and it is very refreshing to have pure 
and simple Bible.” 

‘^What else?” 

“ Oh, I shall study household economy from the 
standpoint of necessity. It shall not be a play- 
thing for a rich lady to play at. I shall make a 
dress or two ” — 

‘^Warm ones: you must have warm clothing 
and a warm sleeping-room in this climate. Now 
don’t you be visionary and shiver, to please your 
father.” 

“ That would not please him. You utterly mis- 
understand. I shall ask Rachel what to get. I 
must send home for my seal suit. One of papa’s 


276 


SECOND BEST, 


last presents to me was a seal coat and muff and 
turban. We went to Canada, and I had them for 
the trip. With them, you needn’t fear that I shall 
freeze. I shall take Sophie’s chamber, and have a 
wood fire : I like a wood fire. I suppose that Mint 
will bring my wood, if I make it worth his lazy 
and saucy while. And I shall learn house- work, 
not merely about house-work. Cooking is a craze 
nowadays, but I shall take it sanely. I will teach 
Rachel Latin and French, and she shall teach me 
how to make some of her delicious cookery. Latin 
was one of papa’s crazes for me. I began Latin 
and English together, I verily believe. He said I 
should know Latin enough to learn Spanish as 
easily as Macaulay did; but of course I couldn’t 
and didn’t. Somebody says Spanish is schoolboys’ 
Latin. I’d like to go on with Spanish ; but that 
is one of the things I like, and so I mustn’t. I 
know I shall get to liking the things I don’t like, 
and then I shan’t know which is m^, that girl or 
this.” 

‘‘You have got to promise me one thing, or you 
shan’t step off this pier.” 

“ Then I’ll jump off,” she laughed. 

“ Oh, I’ll dispose of you if you don’t promise. 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


211 


I’ll toss yon over the railing, and watch to see you 
sink.” 

‘‘ I can swim, thank you.” 

‘‘ So you can. Then I’ll tie a stone about your 
neck : it’s easy to find one exactly your weight.” 

Leila gazed down into the dark water. A boat 
was pulling from the shore ; and, as the oars 
dipped, tongues of shining light seemed to rise out 
of the water and drop back into it. Some one in 
the boat leaned over and played in the water with 
her fingers, and the streaks of light caught in her 
fingers, and she shook them off. 

“ You must promise me to use your common 
sense and not be visionary. You can turn your- 
self about without being a fool, or suffering like a 
martyr. A dollar a day is very small provender 
for a girl like you. Imagine Sophie ! You must 
let me have the oversight of you.” 

Yes, grandfather,” promised Leila, meekly. 

‘‘ I am in earnest,” he exclaimed, angrily. 
‘‘ You are Ostermoor enough to belong to me some- 
how ; and I shall, I do now, demand all the right I 
have in you. You have given no one else the 
right, and I claim it. Somebody has got to look 
after you.” 


278 


SECOND BEST, 


‘‘ I am looking after myself. My father could 
trust me, if you cannot.” 

‘‘Will you promise?” 

“ Of course not. I belong to myself.” 

“ Then I shall run away once a month, and come 
and look after you. May I ? ” 

“ You may run away twice a month ; but you 
shall not look after me. I shall fare as well and 
better than Rachel Ennis.” 

“ She has become inured to hardship.” 

“That’s what I am going to do, — become inured. 
Inured is good.” 

“ You are incorrigible, and I don’t like you. 
But I shall come all the same, for the sake of the 
Ostermoor blood. I shall keep that in circulation.” 

At nine o’clock they found Rachel at the kitchen 
table, sewing. Her father was asleep, with his 
head bent one side, in grandmother’s chair. Mint 
had come home, and was rattling a long story to 
her, balancing himself first on one bare foot, then 
on the other. 

It was not such a very lonesome world, after all, 
Leila felt, without thinking it, as she closed the 
door of her small chamber; and Rachel laid her 
sleepy head on her pillow with a thought of happi- 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


279 


ness in her dreams : And to-morrow I shall have 
more blessings for thee.” 

It was cold everywhere, the wind was blowing, 
somebody was going somewhere, and Leila shivered 
and shivered. She did not know where she was, 
excepting that she was somewhere she did not 
wish to be, and she mu%t get out ; she would jump 
or fly, anything to get out. Then she sobbed and 
cried out in her sleep, and sprang up to And the 
cold wind rushing in at her open window, and 
knew she was on the seashore, and John Ostermoor 
was going home to-morrow, and she would be alone 
in that house, with the morose and sullen father, 
the petulant, ugly old woman, and that boy who 
was always crowding in and listening and saying 
impish things, and Rachel Ennis who belonged to 
them all and did not belong to her ; and it would 
grow worse and worse as winter came on, and she 
was barred in with cold and storms, and could have 
nothing she liked, and would have to do every- 
thing she hated. It was black darkness out the 
window, and, if she lighted her lamp, it would be 
no whit better. The room was bare and shabby 
like the lives of these people, and if she stayed she 
would grow bare and shabby like them. Papa did 


280 


SECOND BEST, 


not mean that. He meant her to grow, and she 
was not growing, she could not grow, in such a 
bleak atmosphere. She would grow wicked and 
discouraged and hateful. She could not be good 
unless she were happy, and now she was as misera- 
ble as she could be ! 

Without resolving or planning, she sprang up. 
The wind and darkness and something in herself 
— the something that was not brave in herself — 
gave the last touch to every mood of the summer, 
and with energetic hands she pushed the window 
down, lighted her lamp, and, in her excitement, 
not wrapping anything about her, began to snatch 
her clothing from the nails on the walls, and her 
things from chair and bureau, and cram them into 
her trunk. She would go home with the Oster- 
moors. Her housekeeper was at home : the house 
should be thrown open to friends, she would read 
and study in the library, and spend money, and go 
about, and do everything she liked, and nothing 
she did not like. She had had her discipline, and 
decided that this life was not best for her. It had 
not brought her a wider horizon. She would find 
that otherwhere. She had tried, and tried hard. 
Papa would be satisfied, if he knew. She could 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


281 


not choose hard things. If God sent them, that 
would be another thing. Before her trunk was 
strapped and locked, she heard Rachel go down- 
stairs to prepare the early breakfast. It was chilly 
in the early sunrise. She ran downstairs, and 
thought she would go out for a last stroll on the 
rocks, then paused at the kitchen door, to go in 
and tell Rachel Ennis that she also was a bird of 
passage, and must take her flight south. 


XV. 


THE NEXT MORNING. 

“We came alone into the world ; alone we must leave it ; in our 
inner selves no society or help can take the place of self-reliance ; 
we ourselves, by ourselves, heed or reject the Divine voice, and 
under God shape or spoil our lives. The greatest essayists and 
moralists of every age have emphasized or restated this fact, which 
every child begins to learn with his alphabet, and which the dying 
old man has no more than mastered as he exchanges worlds and 
leaves his worn-out body. In the right sense, a man, woman, or 
child ought to be, and must be, self-made .” — Sunday School Times, 

“ There are souls in this world that have the gift of finding joy 
everywhere.” — Faher. 

Rachel was standing at the table in the shed, 
mixing biscuits. The chicken was stewing on the 
stove. There was nothing dismal about the break- 
fast odor or in Rachel’s face as she turned to say, 
brightly,— 

‘^Why, Miss Leila!” 

“It is ‘ Why, Miss Leila? ’ I am going, too. I 
came to tell you. I decided in the night. I have 
a way of deciding things in the night. I go to 
sleep with my mind all made up to do one thing, 
and awake, moved by some impulse in me, to de- 


THE NEXT MORNING. 


283 


cide another way. The spirit to go has been 
strongest in me all the time; but I was not con- 
scious of it. I thought I should stay and be good ; 
now I shall go — and be good. I need a great deal 
of cheerfulness to live, and a great deal of humility 
and unselfishness; and I haven’t any, — not this 
morning. I’m not proud of myself this morning.” 

Rachel laughed, and kept on with her work. 

“ I am sorry, if you would like me to stay.” 

I should, certainly,” was the frank reply. ‘‘ I 
thought I would like ” — 

Tell me, please ; don’t hesitate.” 

But how could she say — “ to help you ” ? 

What would you like to do for me ? ” urged 
Leila. 

‘‘ Oh, help you to be cheerful,” said Rachel, 
easily. 

‘‘ I’d like to know what makes you cheerful ! I 
should want to — die, if I were in your place to- 
day and every day.” 

‘‘ That would not help,” cried Rachel, merrily. 

“ But I can’t like to be poor,” said Leila, rebel- 
liously. “ I can’t like to endure., and if I don’t 
have to I will not. Wouldn’t you like to have 
things?” 


284 


SECOND BEST. 


‘‘I do,” was the contented answer. 

I believe you do,” exclaimed Leila, admiringly. 

‘‘ I wish you would tell me your impression of me. 
You see clearly. Do not be afraid. I tell you I 
am exacting and demanding until my friends 
weary of me, and I have my own way when I can 
get it, and I am going home to get it now. Tell 
me,” she demanded, playfully. 

‘‘ I would rather not.” 

‘‘ But I mu%t know. It will not hurt me.” 

‘‘ It will not do you any good.” 

Yes, it will.” 

‘‘ I have no right to have a deep impression yet. 

I have not known you long enough.” 

‘‘ Nonsense ! ” was the impatient rejoinder. 

“ Then I will tell you. I am disappointed in 
you.^'* 

“Whew!” laughed Leila. “You take my/ 
breath away. What did you expect? ” 

“ I expected too much.” 

“Do you usually expect too much of people?” 

“ No.” 

“ Then you are not often disappointed in peo- 
ple ? ” she said, trying to speak lightly. 

“No.” 


THE NEXT MORNING. 


285 


You were not in Miss Ostermoor ? ” 

“ Oh, no, indeed ! ” exclaimed Rachel. 

“Nor Mr. Ostermoor?” 

“ No : he is just as fine as I thought.” 

“What ails me?” Leila demanded, tempering 
her displeasure. What right had a girl who wore 
coarse shoes and kept boarders to judge her ? 

“ I — don’t know.” 

“ I believe you do — and will not tell me,” she 
replied, very much inclined to quarrel, in a lady- 
like way. 

“ If I knew, how have I a right to tell you ? ” 

“ Because I asked you,” returned Leila, impa- 
tiently. 

“You demanded,” laughed Rachel. “You said 
true of yourself in that.” 

Leila turned away. She was angry, — angry be- 
cause this girl had told her the truth, the truth 
she had exacted. For one who had gone through 
life giving so little she expected a great deal. 

Every day Rachel Ennis made her life ; every 
day Leila Provost marr^ hers. In each case, it 
was the outcome of self-development. Hawthorne 
says : “ The thing is only to do with life what 
we ought, and what is suited to each of its stages, 


286 


SECOND BEST, 


— do all, enjoy all, — and I suppose these two rules 
amount to the same thing.” 

Leila had her stroll on the rocks, and came to 
breakfast only when Mint ran after her and 
brought her. When she told John Osterrnoor she 
was going home and back to her old life, he did 
not look satisfied. Perhaps he, too, was “disap- 
pointed ” in her. 

“I wish you would tell me why you look so,” 
she said, impatiently, the first moment they were 
alone together. 

“Because it was helping me to go home and 
please my father, to do something contrary to my 
inclinations and desires, to think that a little thing 
like you could be brave and please her father, and 
make something better of herself. I shall go just 
the same, and something else will help me.” 

“ Perhaps Rachel Ennis will,” said Leila, mock- 
iiigly. 

“And Sophie,” said John, simply. “I am such 
a weak fellow, I need a woman to help me.” 

“ And I am not that woman,” thought Leila, 
with a chill at her heart. 

“ It says in the Bible,” John went on, “some- 
thing about the carpenter encouraging the gold- 


THE NEXT MORNING. 


287 


smith, or the other way, — anyhow, somebody 
encouraged somebody, — put heart into them : it’s 
a great help.” 

And he had sought to encourage ” her by what 
he had said on the pier last night ! 

The journey home by train and boat was dull 
and bitter to her. She purchased a novel in Bos- 
ton, and tried to forget herself in it. She had a 
long crying spell in her berth that night, and in 
the morning hated her first glimpse of New York. 

“Well?” said John, in a dry, interrogative 
tone, standing beside her on the wharf. 

“Well!” echoed Leila, with a laugh of saucy 
defiance. 

“You have heard that Shetland ponies, accus- 
tomed to fish, have learned to eat hay?” 

“But I’m not a Shetland pony” — 

“ And can’t rise to hay I May I put you in a 
carriage ? ” 

“You shall not ‘put’ me anywhere. Good-by, 
Sophie.” 


XVI. 


SNATCHES. 

“We treat God with irreverence by banishing Him from our 
thoughts, by not referring to His will on slight occasions; and 
what is true of the Deity is true of His revelation. We have His 
words not often enough upon our lips, nor deeply enough in our 
memories, nor loyally enough in our lives. The snow, the wind, 
the vapor, fulfil His word ; are our acts and thoughts lighter and 
wilder than these, that we should forget it ” — Ruskin. 

The winter was over. Delia had spent three 
Sundays at home, Sophie wrote every week, Leila 
wrote once, thanking Rachel for being sufficiently 
brave to tell her she was “disappointed” in her, 
and Anna Ryder’s husband had been one of the 
Ennis household through the winter. One of the 
Ennis household had gone away : the grandmother 
was not in her chair at the kitchen window, nor 
“ cuddled down ” in the blankets Rachel went to 
Portland to buy for her. The fretful lips were still. 
The tired old heart had stopped its beating. Her 
son missed her. Mint said it was “ queer ” without 
grandmother, and Rachel for some time had a way 
of turning quickly toward the cushioned arm-chair, 
to see if grandmother needed anything. 


SJVA TCHES. 


289 


No one was very sorry. Rachel hoped she was 
beginning again somewhere in the Father’s wide 
House. Her son never spoke of her. It was not 
his way to speak of the dead. To him she was 
not living. 

One evening in April, after the early supper, 
the small household had gathered itself together in 
the parlor. They had used the room as a sitting- 
room since the arm-chair in the kitchen had been 
left empty. Dr. Ennis was lying on the old-fash- 
ioned, horse-hair sofa, covered warmly with one of 
grandmother’s new blankets. He liked to listen 
to the evening talk. Rachel was sewing at a 
round table drawn to the wood-stove. She was 
making a shirt for her father. Mint, opposite her, 
was cross over an example in long division that 
covered one side of his large slate. Cornelius 
Arnold, with a book in his hand, stood behind 
Rachel’s chair. 

“Dr. Ennis, you asked me to-day what my brain 
had been busy about in my long idleness. Since I 
have grown stronger, I have jotted down some of 
the thoughts my mind snatches at, and, if to-night 
is not a bad time for it, I will read you a few 
pages. I did it for my wife. She often asks what 


290 


SECOND BEST. 


I am thinking. She will read the book to me 
some day. Probably you will say I think only in 
one line. I do not know how I have thought : I 
only know I could not stop thinking, and, as 
Ruskin says, what you choose to grasp with your 
mind is the question, much more serious than how 
you handle it afterward.” 

‘‘I question that,” came out sharply from the 
blanket on the sofa. 

Rachel would have been surprised had he not 
questioned it : nowadays he questioned every- 
thing. 

^‘Ruskin goes on to say,” Arnold continued, 
u c What does it matter how you build, if you have 
bad bricks to build with; or how you reason, if 
the ideas with which you begin are foul or false ? 
And in general all fatal, false reasoning proceeds 
from people’s having some one false notion in their 
hearts, with which they are resolved their reason- 
ing shall comply.’ ” 

“Then this book will reveal to us your ‘or^e 
false notion ? ’ ” replied the voice under the blanket. 

“If it be there, I fervently hope so,” was the 
response. “Whether false or true, my mind has 
chosen to grasp these thoughts, and let others slip, 


SNATCHES. 


291 


or push others off. I thought you might care, too, 
Rachel. Many of them have cropped up after our 
conversations. 

‘‘I do care,” said Rachel. “I am learning that 
what I choose is the real me.” 

Without any self-consciousness, Arnold opened 
his book at the first page, and began to read. 

Dr. Ennis pushed the blanket away and lifted 
his head, resting it upon one hand, leaning back 
against the sofa pillow. Rachel sewed and lis- 
tened. Mint bit at a corner of the frame of his 
slate, with his eyes wandering from one face to 
another. Watching people was one of the pleas- 
ures of his life. 

‘‘ Old people and children would have a hard 
time in this world, if it were not for somebody’s 
kindness. 

“It is a gain to delight in things contrary to 
ourselves, not to let them (unless they are evil) 
go against us. 

“ It is trying to have a taste and no talent for 
doing a thing. Then is the time to keep on, and 
find out what the taste can be made into. 

“ I wonder what it is to be more than a con- 
queror. 


292 


SECOND BEST, 


‘‘ Can I answer ‘ yes ’ to the question, Have 
I done every single thing Christ bids me ? When 
I believe in Christ, what shall I believe ? 

‘‘ Paul says. Believe that He is raised from the 
dead. 

My resurrection depends upon His.” 

‘‘ Read that again,” said the sofa listener. 

It was repeated, no comment was made, and the 
reader went on : — 

The apostles acted under the direct agency of 
the Holy Spirit: to them He was the ascended 
Christ. 

‘‘An old lady said to-day she would not be 
mean enough to ask for something new without 
giving thanks for the old. St. Paul would not, 
either : he said, ‘ With thanksgiving let your re- 
quests be made known.’ 

“ I ask but two pleasures in life : labor and rest, 
that is, day and night. 

“ It is hard for a home to be sunny when father 
and mother both look on the dark side of life.” 

Lifting his head. Mint interrupted : “ Whose 
house did that come out of? I guess it’s the 
Grey’s. And I believe you get something out of 
everybody’s house.” 


SJVA TCHES. 


293 


“ Don’t you ? ” asked Arnold, smiling. 

Mint’s chin dropped again on the wooden edge 
of his slate. 

‘‘Mrs. Quickly comforted Falstaff on his death- 
bed by bidding him not to think of God, as there 
was no need to trouble himself with such thoughts 
yet. 

“ Huber, the great authority on bees, conducted 
his observations and studies through the eyes of 
his wife : he was blind from his seventeenth year. 

“ May I believe, may every servant of God be- 
lieve, that the things that happen to him fall out 
to the furtherance of the gospel. 

“In the old time, the disciples of Christ were 
required to do more than believe : they had to 
suffer for His sake. 

“ Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and suffer 
for Him : perhaps we also would suffer, if we took 
up our cross daily and followed Him. We take it 
up once in a while and follow Him. 

“ What we really trust God for we shall get 
somehow, somewhere. Where in His book does 
He tell us how and where? 

“ Abraham went to the place God showed him. 
Is that the place we go to ? 


294 


SECOND BEST, 


‘‘We must have faith to take things afterward 
as well as beforehand : for instance, the remission 
of sins that are past. 

“ God allows us to bring experiences upon our- 
selves as Paul did when he appealed to Caesar : if 
he had not appealed to Caesar, they would have 
let him go. 

“ How do we not know that a trouble has come 
because we have not prayed enough about it ? 

“ Oh, how sorrowful to learn that we have 
given our strength for that which is not bread ! 

“ Let us make our time of discipline as sunshiny 
as we can ; let us help God make it a good time 
for us. 

“We say some things ought not to be as they 
are. Our business is with things as they are, not 
as they ought to be. 

“ To-day, as I talked with somebody, I thought, 
‘You are one of the people that nobody prays for,’ 
and I determined to put a new petition in my 
prayers : God bless the people that nobody prays 
for.” 

As Dr. Ennis listened, he was glad for the first 
time in his life that he had somebody to pray for 
him : he had long ago given up praying for himself. 


SNATCHES. 


295 


If I should tell a woman on the street that a 
part of her dress was in disorder and slipping off, 
she might thank me gratefully; but, if I should 
tell her that her love of dress would be her ruin, 
she would turn and say it was none of my business. 

If I should tell a man that the ashes from his 
cigar were burning a hole in his coat, he would 
say politely, ‘ Thank you, sir ’ ; but, if I should tell 
him that so many cigars a day would give him 
heart disease, he would say I was an impertinent 
fellow.” 

Mint laughed, with a great deal of appreciation. 

‘‘About two things we are told not to faint: 
not to faint in prayer, not to faint when we are 
rebuked. We have no right to have so little 
strength. 

“ Faint, yet pursuing, is a good battle cry. 

“ I saw somebody to-day whose life motto seems 
to be, Gret through : she needs to be deepened. An 
hour after I saw another whose motto is. Be 
thorough: she needs to be hastened. 

“Is it a grander thing to use money than to 
earn money? 

“ When one fails of the ideal we have made of 
him, he falls so far in our estimate of him that we 


296 


SECOND BEST. 


judge him harshly and unjustly. He has not 
fallen below his own standard, but ours, re- 
member.” 

Now it was Rachel’s time to interrupt. She 
dropped her work to say : O Mr. Arnold, that 
reminds me how unjust I was to Miss Leila last 
summer. I told her I was disappointed in her. I 
fell in love with her that first time I saw her, and 
imagined her to be beyond any ideal I could make, 
and when I found her so natural I almost hated 
her for it. I thought she was vain and exacting 
and imperious, and, now I consider, I do not be- 
lieve she was any of them. I could not reconcile 
her manner and her evident — not poverty ex- 
actly, but not being rich. Had she been a princess 
in disguise, she couldn’t have put on more airs, — 
it seemed airs, because she is not a princess. I 
thought perhaps she had rich relatives and had 
learned their ways. I have been thinking about 
her all this week. I wish she would come again. 
I wouldn’t make an ideal another time.” 

“ She went off in a tearing hurry,” commented 
Mint. 

‘‘ Perhaps she will come back in one,” said 
Arnold. Shall I stop ? ” 


SNA TCHES. 


297 


“No,” replied Dr. Ennis: “your thoughts are 
in marked contrast to what I see with my eyes 
turned inward.” 

“ One cannot be angry at something without 
being angry at somebody, — at least, it is very hard 
not to. 

“ Eternal life is not one’s birthright unless one 
is born another time.” 

“ Then,” said Dr. Ennis, “ eternal death is one’s 
birthright if he is born but once.” 

“ What is a birthright ? ” asked Mint. 

“ The right your birth gives you,” replied his 
father. 

“ I should think that was a hivth-wrong then,” 
said Mint, “ to have eternal death.” 

“ So I think,” added his father. 

“ But not when there’s a second birthright, 
father,” interposed Rachel, eagerly, “ when being 
born once gives you a right to being born again. 
That is a part of the first birthright. God gives 
the second right because He is so sorry that we 
have to have the first.” 

“ I’m glad of that,” said Mint, who had learned 
to understand from his habit of watching and 
listening. 


298 


SECOND BEST, 


No one in the house had grown this winter like 
the twelve-year-old boy. 

This was a household without the heritage of 
prayer. Until Cornelius Arnold came there had 
been no family worship. Dr. Ennis told him that 
in his father’s and grandfather’s house the custom 
wr.s unknown. 

It fills up the time for me,” he added. 

“Don’t stop,” urged Rachel. “We haven’t 
come to your one false notion yet.” 

“ It is on the next page,” he said, turning the 
page. “ Having a little at a time keeps one in a 
thankful frame of mind, or a fretful frame. 

“ I saw some one to-day who had lost what he 
had by misuse and disuse. My heart has not 
ached just so for many a day. 

“ If the goodness laid up for us does not come 
to-day, it is still laid up, — out of our reach, it may 
be, but God’s hand can touch it any day. 

“ While somebody is deciding whose painful 
duty it is, let’s call it ours. 

“ The strength of our life depends as much upon 
our heart rests as upon our heart beats. 

“ Children have to grow up to understand their 
father, — sometimes never do, not till the father 


SNA TCHES. 


299 


is taken. A child’s love is all in faith. It is a 
pity that fathers, like the Father in heaven, will 
not take pains to interpret themselves to the timid 
little ones. It might literally be to take pains^ 
which is what Christ did to reveal the Father to 
His children. After all, how little is done in this 
world without taking pains. 

‘‘We have to put things in ward to know the 
will of the Lord, as Moses put the man in when 
he did not know what to do with him.” 

“ Oh, good ! ” exclaimed Rachel. “ I have lots 
of things in ward. My ward is full.” 

“ Mine is full of one thing,” said Arnold. 

“ What ? ” asked Mint, who was fearless in ask- 
ing questions. 

“ Mint, dear,” warned Rachel. 

“ It is whether I should go to my wife or bring 
her to me. I am ready for work. And there’s 
work to be had. In a village I know there’s 
work for a teacher. We two would have to live 
on seven hundred a year. But, as somebody says, 
‘honest bread is all well enough: it’s the butter 
that makes the temptation.’ There would be 
plenty of honest bread, but I do want her to have 
honest butter.’^ 


300 


SECOND BEST. 


'A succession of loud taps on the street door 
of the kitchen brought Mint to his feet. In a 
moment he returned with two letters. Captain 
Grey had brought them. The foreign letter was 
from Switzerland. Rachel’s letter was in the 
handwriting of Leila Provost. 

“ Thinking about her has done it,” Rachel ex- 
claimed, delightedly. “ She must have been think- 
ing of me.” 

For five minutes the letters were read in si- 
lence. Mint began to work vigorously on his 
slate. Dr. Ennis sighed, and drew the blanket 
about him again : he had not been strong this 
winter. Rachel had become accustomed to tuck- 
ing him up on the sofa. 

My prisoner is out of ward,” exclaimed Ar- 
nold, joyfully. ‘‘ On the next train I start for 
Switzerland. My wife wishes to remain with the 
girls she is instructing, and asks me if I will travel 
with two bo3^s, — their brothers, — and then, if 
the way is open, we will come home to our village 
school, or I may be strong enough by that time to 
earn some butter with my honest bread. Miss 
Rachel, will you miss your boarder ? ” 

“ Not so much, for I am to have another. 


SATA TCHES. 


301 


Here’s a story for you ; but, perhaps, I can’t tell 
you. I must wait and know. Miss Leila has 
written me the frankest, sweetest, most heart- 
breaking letter about herself, and asked to come 
for as long a time as I can keep her. She wishes 
to learn to do everything I do, and says winter 
shall not frighten her away.” 

The last sentences of Leila’s letter ran : ‘‘ It 
was this that brought me to myself : ‘ Your father 
died believing that you had given your word to 
him to do as he wished. You had brought your- 
self to conform so far to his wishes that he be- 
lieved you would go all the length of them.’ I 
let him believe it ; I wished him to believe it ; 
I believed it myself. I can see it now as clearly as 
if it were another girl. I think you helped me ; 
I cannot tell you how. I knew you would do it. 
It will not be too hard now : it would be too hard 
not to do it.” 

Mint had gone back to his slate. He looked up 
to say, Ray, what is in your letter to make your 
cheeks like roses and your eyes like stars? ” 

Something better than stars and roses.” And 
then Sophie’s words came to her about shining 
like the stars forever and ever. 


302 


SECOND BEST, 


“ Arnold, come here.” 

Arnold went, drawing his chair close to the 
sofa, taking the thin, cold fingers into his warm, 
soft hand. 

The blind man loved the touch of Arnold’s hand. 

“ How do you pray ? ” 

, The question was unexpected and abrupt. Ar- 
nold laughed. If he did not pray exactly as he 
did, I do not believe he could have laughed ex- 
actly as he did. The joy of it came out of his 
answered prayer, the answer that came by the way 
of Switzerland. The laugh rippled off into a 
quiet enthusiasm in his tone : “ I really believe 
there is no subject in the world that rouses my 
enthusiasm like that of prayer. All my life I 
have been making ready and being made ready to 
pray as I do to-night. I expect to pray in heaven 
exactly as I pray on earth. Yes, exactly in 
reply to the quick motion of surprise, ‘ Thy will 
be done on earth as it is done in heaven ’ ; and 
praying is more a part of His will than even the 
Christian di*eams of. 

I pray because I want something. 

‘‘ In heaven I shall pray because I want some- 
thing. 


SATA TCHES. 


303 


I prav because God wants to give me some- 
thing. 

“ In heaven I shall pray because God wants to 
give me something. 

“ Christ prayed on earth exactly as he is praying 
in heaven. If he is praying in heaven, to be like 
him, as we shall be when we see him as he is, I 
must pray in heaven. I could not be myself, — 
myself born the second time, — unless I pray. 

‘‘By prayer, I understand talking to God and 
with God, both hearing Him and asking Him ques- 
tions, about what He would have me do, where He 
would have me go ; and I do believe Switzerland 
is the ‘place ’ He is showing me.” 

Dr. Ennis sighed ; but he did not withdraw his 
hand from the warm touch. 

“ Are you ever discouraged ? ” 

The tone was hardly questioning : it seemed to 
imply only that everybody was discouraged — 
some time. 

There was a pause before the reply. Dr. Enhis 
could not see the flash of the eye ; but he could 
hear the sure, quick, “No.” 

“ Then you have never had anything to dis- 
courage you.” 


304 


SECOND BEST, 


Then Arnold laughed again. I wish you might 
hear him laugh. I cannot put it on paper. It 
was like the sound of the singing that night Paul 
and Silas were in prison. 

‘‘ I believe I have never been without what may 
be called ‘discouragements.’ ” 

“But I mean hedged in all around, with every- 
thing to push you back, and notliing to push you 
on.” 

“ One of the real tight places,” said Arnold. 
“ I’ve been there.” 

“ Then weren’t you discouraged ? ” 

“ There was one place that was not hedged in.” 

“ I thought so,” was the reply, with a little smile 
of triumph. “ I knew you had never been there.” 

Arnold’s tone was very grave in its joyfulness : 
“ The way that was not hedged in was the way to 
get closer and closer to the only way out. I am 
the Way, says one. My wife found the way out 
in her time of discouragement. But, if we hedge 
our way to God, how can our hearts help breaking 
with discouragement ? We have a right to be dis- 
couraged then. That is discouragement. When 
God cannot help us, no help can come. On the 
cross Jesus cried out with a loud voice, asking his 


SNA TCHES. 


305 


Father why He had forsaken him. But he bore 
that forsaking that you and I might not have it to 
bear.” 

“Did you ever think He had forsaken you?” 
questioned Dr. Ennis, low and subdued. 

‘Yes, once. I learned then what my life here 
on earth would be without keeping close to Him. 
That is discouragement, — having your heart taken 
out of you, your very breath taken away. How 
long ago that is. I learned what His presence 
was to me. I found out that life without Him 
was death. But His presence has been with me 
since (except at rare moments) so consciously and 
joyously that I forgot when you asked me that I 
ever had lost heart wholly. Do not call anything 
else — no matter what the trouble is — discourage- 
ment. I remember that I could not eat or sleep or 
shed one blessed tear till I heard a voice in another 
room read, ‘I love the Lord because He hath 
heard my voice and my supplication.’ My heart 
melted with love, the tears came, the hardness was 
gone, He has never let go of me since. He holds 
me, as I hold you, by the right hand. I feel the 
touch of His hand as you feel mine. I would not 
take the whole of heaven if I had to have it with- 
out ever seeing His face.’’ 


306 


SECOND BEST. 


After a moment the listener spoke : “ Your dark 
time is over. Your strength has returned, you 
have labor before you, you are going to your wife. 
I congratulate you.” 

Arnold pressed the cold hand between his two 
palms, arose, and left him. Rachel’s tears were 
dropping on her work, — the shirt he would never 
wear, perhaps. 

Mint’s big, misty eyes were on his father’s face. 

It’s so hard, so hard,” his father sighed, in a 
kind of rebellious resignation. ‘‘It’s so hard to 
give up work.” 

“ It was not hard for Christ to give up work, 
father,” Rachel replied, after a moment. “He 
came to do his Father’s work, and when he said, 
‘ It is finished,’ he was glad.” 

“ But it was jinisTied^^^ he answered, with quick 
decision. 

“ And who has said yours is finished? ” 

“He who made me blind,” with irritation 
scarcely controlled. “ He who will not restore my 
sight.” 

“ Father, dear, perhaps there is some work for 
you to do in the dark.” 

“ But my life isn’t worth anything.” 

“ It is worth God’s giving.” 


XVII. 


WHEN IT WAS OVER. 

The secret of thriving is thrift : to get as much work as possi- 
ble done with . . . the least wear and tear.” — Charles Kingsley. 

“ The wealth of man is the number of things which he loves 
and blesses, which he is loved and blessed by.” — Carlyle. 

Three years after that evening in April came 
another evening in April, in that same plain, cosy 
parlor. Mint is there, three years older and three 
years taller ; but he is not through the arithmetic 
yet. The example on his slate is in square root 
to-night, and he would not have gotten through 
it had it not been for a hint from Leila Provost. 
She is making a gingham dress at the table where 
Rachel also sits sewing. Dr. Ennis lies on the 
sofa : his evenings are always on the sofa, often 
his afternoons. He is doing something in the 
dark that has softened his lips and sweetened his 
voice. 

Rachel is three years older; but she does not 
look as if she were growing older, only as if her 
whole nature were ripening. 


308 


SECOND BEST, 


Leila has grown three years younger. Her 
cheeks are plump with a pretty, faint health tinge. 
Dr. Ennis told her to-day that she had pure blood 
in good circulation through sound organs. 

There are several letters on the table between 
the girls. Delia’s is from Liverpool. She has 
taken a voyage with her husband in the bark 
it Pilgrim.” It is a happy letter. Charlie is so 
good to her, and she is having %uch a good time, 
and loves everybody at home better than ever. 

Sophie Ostermoor’s was written in Paris. She 
is with her father on a business trip. There are 
seven sheets in her envelope : three are written to 
Leila, the others to Rachel. Rachel has a letter 
from Anna Arnold. Hers was mailed in New 
York City, where her husband is teaching. They 
are living in a flat, and their baby girl is named 
Sophie, and the world is a happy place to live in. 
Her husband is full of work of all kinds, and 
drawing her into everything he is interested in, 
to the serious detriment of housekeeping in flve 
rooms and her baby’s pretty clothing. 

Leila has her semi-weekly letter from John Os- 
termoor. She is proud of him ; and he loves his 
“cousin and friend” in a very straightforward 


WHEN IT WAS OVER, 


309 


fashion, and tells her so, — as cousin and friend 
only she steadfastly believes. She is trying very 
hard to be satisfied with his friendly and cousinly 
letters and attentions ; but — things get mixed up, 
and she gets mixed up, and she wishes, sometimes, 
that they had not a claim on the same great- 
grandfather : then she would know what to do. 
But no one is ‘‘ disappointed ” in her to-night. 
She is not disappointed in herself. For three hard 
and happy years she has been one of this simple 
household. She has done everything Rachel 
Ennis had done : she has washed and ironed, 
baked, churned, swept, sewed, made carpet rags 
and half a dozen shirts, summer and winter 
dresses for herself, darned threadbare stockings, 
put buttons on shabby shoes, crocheted and knit- 
ted and economized, saving out of her stinted al- 
lowance to give money, and to work with money 
for others. Rachel did these things, and she 
could. Rachel did these things willingly and 
cheerfully, and she did them willingly and cheer- 
fully. She loved her life. It was as fresh and 
breezy as a run over the rocks or a tramp through 
the pine woods. Several times Rachel has taken 
a vacation for a week, and she enjoyed being 


SIO 


SECOND BEST, 


housekeeper. The hardest part of it was the 
economy; for how could she cook the cook-book 
through on her weekly allowance? 

There has been church and Sunday-school work 
during these three years, with numberless social 
gatherings. She has made the tips of her fingers 
sore in sewing carpet-rags for the parsonage, and 
knit woollen socks and made dresses for the box 
that was sent to the home missionary freezing in 
his half-built cabin, delighting in the pretty things 
she managed to buy for thq missionary’s invalid 
wife and three-year-old daughter. And one sum- 
mer she and Rachel “ took boarders,” without 
extra help (except for the washing and ironing), 
and with the money thus earned furnished the 
parlor chamber with curtains, carpet, and a suit of 
antique oak. 

Books she let alone. She thought, instead of 
having some one to think for her, and studied the 
Bible without even references. She was very 
happy when she found out for herself that He- 
brews illuminated Leviticus. 

She has helped herself : now she is ready to be 
helped. 

The Old Testament has become a new book to 


PVI/£JV IT WAS OVER. 


311 


her. At first she loved the Old Testament be- 
cause Christ did, and then she loved it because it 
showed her how God’s hand touched the lives of 
men, how it touched her life, and how in every 
page Christ, the Messiah to come, was shown to 
his people, and would be shown to all his world. 

One month she studied nothing but the small 
book of Zephaniah. 

‘‘The word of the Lord which came to Zeph- 
aniah,” she read aloud, sitting alone in her cham- 
ber. “ I should think he would have been more 
glad of that than of anything,” she said, aloud. 

She had learned the signification of his name : 
Jehovah hath guarded, or hidden. Was the Lord 
not hiding her, according to her father’s wish, 
away from the world, that she might learn about 
Him and about herself, and what she was to Him, 
and what He was to her, — that she might do what 
He would have her do ? 

“ The word of the Lord which came unto Leila. 
But no word can be my word unless the Holy 
Spirit gives it to me. Holy Spirit, give the word 
of the Lord to me,” she prayed. 

She had learned to love the old Book with 
the enthusiasm with which some girls love their 


312 


SECOND BEST. 


Browning and Shakspere and Lowell and Tenny- 
son. The poetry lovers give vent to their enthu- 
siasm. Leila spoke of her own to no one but 
Rachel and John Ostermoor. 

“ She is the oddest girl,” Sophie often said to 
John. 

The word of the Lord came to Joel and Micah 
and Hosea, but not Zephaniah's word. The word 
of the Lord was as wide and as deep .as the sea and 
the sky and men’s hearts. Was her heart being 
prepared for this word that came to Zephaniah? 
Would it be her word from the Lord through the 
shining of the Holy Spirit ? 

She shut the book : the page was dazzling ; she 
could not look upon it yet. She was intensely 
alive, every nerve was alert, every drop in her 
veins was a drop of nervous fluid ; but for sleep 
and exercise and the air of the sea, this time would 
have been exhausting. As it was, she throve 
physically and mentally as never before. 

To John Ostermoor, when alone with pen and 
paper, she could talk as easily and unreservedly as 
she could think. Under the spell of his presence 
she became shy, and talked of things outside of 
herself. He said he would never have known her 
but for her letters. 


WHEN IT WAS OVER. 


313 


To him she wrote : “ I believe I pray more than 
I do anything else. I have to; I should be so 
wicked if I did not; I should grow rebellious. I 
have to say many times a day, some days : ‘ Father, 
help me to be patient and to want Thy will more 
than anything else.’ And it does seem that the 
days I have the most spiritual light and desire to 
do God’s will I am tried the most. I know it is 
so. And, just think, what would become of my 
strong, intense nature if I could not pray ! I am 
very impatient and childish in regard to my 
prayers, too. I don’t like to wait. I want to 
know what God is going to do with my prayers, 
and yet I have always the quiet assurance that He 
is going to do the best thing. If I did not believe 
it, my heart would break. 

“ My life has seen many — not hard times, but 
unhappy times ; but I never should have learned 
that my Father was in my life had it been one 
of uninterrupted gladness. My praying times are 
like singing times. My life is all working and 
praying and thanking. 

‘‘ Saving and giving and doing and learning 
make every day exciting. 

I try not to think of what I may do or must do 


314 


SECOND BEST, 


when my probation is ended. I shall not have to 
decide alone anyway. I am getting so frisky that 
I hope it will not have to be to settle down into 
quietness. As if my present life were not the very 
essence of quietness ! ” 

This evening, after the three years were over, 
the two friends sat together as usual, but, not as 
usual, with very few words, — an exclamation now 
and then, a question, an answer, as though both 
were absorbed and simply speaking for the sake of 
speaking. Rachel’s life was laid out for her as 
long as her father needed her hourly thought and 
ministry. After that, there was work in the 
world. She was only at school ” now. 

I know ! ” Leila exclaimed, with a note of joy- 
ous surprise in her voice. I’ll take a rest. You 
know what Ruskin says, — please don’t say I’m 
forever quoting him, for I’m forgetting all the 
books I ever dipped into ! He says there’s no 
music in a rest, but there’s the making of music 
in it; I’ll run away for change and rest, and come 
home and make music.” 

“ Where will you run to ? ” inquired Mint. 

Away — far away. And then open my house, 
get my old housekeeper back, and do the best I 


WHEN IT WAS OVER. 


315 


can with myself and my money. Perhaps all that 
I am for is to take my life by the day, and do the 
good that’s nearest and get the good that’s nearest. 
I haven’t a calling, and I don’t know anything 
about i%m% ; but I love to do everything that 
comes into a common-place woman’s life. It will 
be the surprise of my life if I end in nothing but a 
common-place woman,” she said, with a merry 
laugh. Nowadays girls amount to something. I 
think I shall have to be content with the ‘ endless 
variety ’ of my ‘ own fireside.’ ” 

“ But your life will be gone by that time, and 
you will be too old for anything,” advised wise 
Mint. 

‘‘ I shall not be too old to go to heaven,” said 
Leila, gravely, “ and that’s all I desire after I am 
through. If to be common-place there is to be 
like everybody else, I shall be satisfied.” 

I would like to see you rest,” observed Rachel. 
‘‘You do not know how. You will do some wild 
thing.” 

“You will see,” said Leila. “ I would like to go 
to Switzerland, to Aunt Wesie. She is papa’s 
only sister. She needs me. I would like to tramp 
and climb in Switzerland. I think that would be 
a ‘rest.’” 


316 


SECOND BEST, 


As she spoke, she played nervously with John 
Ostermoor’s letter. His letter was not a rest to 
her: it was incoherent, undecided, irritable. He, 
too, asked what wild thing she was planning to do 
next. 

My little girl has never had a rest,” said the 
fond, weak voice under the wrappings. “ Her life 
has all been second-best.” 

O father, dear,” cried Rachel, in loving pro- 
test, “ my life is as wide as the will of God for me. 
What is best, if His wisdom is second-best?” 

And then, as on that night three years ago, 
came a knock at the kitchen door, and Mint has- 
tened to answer it. It was not letters this time, 
but a telegram for Miss Leila Provost : — 

‘‘Cablegram from Sophie. Father very ill. 
Sail immediately. Will write as soon as I can. 
Don’t do anything till you hear. Stay where you 
are.” 

The next day she had a letter written the hour 
of sailing : — 

“ My dear Leila ,, — If I had an hour to write, I 
should be able to think what to say ; but you’ve 
got to hear the thing that tumbles out first, as my 


WHEN IT WAS OVER, 


317 


messenger stands on tiptoe to run ashore with this. 
You know I love you, — ten thousand times better 
than I loved Anna Ryder. She began making a 
man of me, and you finished the business. Don’t 
take me unless you think I’m worth taking ; but 
if you don’t I hope the ship will run aground and 
— not hurt anybody hut me. Your 

‘‘John.” 

There had been so little “love-making” in her 
cousinly friendship with John Ostermoor that 
Leila felt herself almost too easily won ; but she 
wrote to him that that must be because the love 
had been made for them without any “ making” of 
their own. 

She had begun to think of herself as living a 
brave life alone, of being the beautiful maiden 
lady Rachel Ennis was growing into; but, — the 
“ but ” always came between, and had the face of 
John Ostermoor, as well as his manliness and en- 
couragement ; and, then, as she wrote him (in 
self-excuse), every one who had any knowledge of 
life understood that every human being in it, not 
a child, or somebody dedicated like Paul to special 
service, was looking forward to loving and being 


318 


SECOND BEST, 


loved, or looking back upon it. It is life ; and a 
book without it, a story of men and women with- 
out it, would be a story without life in it. It 
began as soon as God made Eve, and the memory 
of it will be sweet in heaven when the earth is 
burned up. She felt better after she had made 
sure her position in her own eyes, and told him 
frankly that the reason she wanted to tramp and 
climb in Switzerland was to get rid of the haunt- 
ing thought that she was no more to him than 
friend and cousin. If she loved him first, she was 
proud of it, because it proved her discernment, and 
she wouldn’t have been half of what she was if 
she had not been afraid he would be disappointed 
in her. Of course this was weakness ; but it was 
such a rest and happiness to be thus weak that she 
would not try to be strong until — to-morrow. 


XVIII. 


“COMMON-PLACE.” 

“ Every man feels instinctively that all the beautiful sentiments 
in the world weigh less than a single lovely action/^ — Lowell. 

Thirty years ago, when I was born,” Rachel 
thought, kneeling in the summer twilight on her 
consecrated stone, “ had I known God as I know 
Him now, and had been asked if I were willing to 
be born into His world and live under the care 
and in the keeping of His love and wisdom, would 
I not have said yes^ joyfully ? 

‘‘ Am I not joyfully willing to be born into 
another world, to be kept there by His love and 
wisdom, knowing Him as I know Him now ? ” 

Tears were coming, but softly : they were com- 
forting tears. That day the village doctor told 
her that, without change and rest, she would die. 
Her ministry for her father was taken from her 
in the winter. Delia was in Spain with her hus- 
band. She and Mint had been alone with her 
father day and night. He went to sleep. When 
she touched his hand, he did not stir. She did 


320 


SECOND BEST. 


not say, “ Father.” An hour before she had said, 
“ Father,” and he smiled. 

Now they were alone, she and Mint ; and the 
doctor said, without rest and change, she could 
not stay with him long. 

Would her father call this “second-best,” like 
all the rest of her life ? 

She was young to give up work. Her hands 
were free, she was ready for work : would it not 
be given her ? 

She would tell Leila. They were coming to- 
morrow, — Leila and her husband and Sophie and 
her invalid father. 

She lifted herself. She was not strong, but 
must she die simply because she was not strong ? 

She was tired of being cheerful. She would 
like to go away by herself and be as cheerless as 
she felt. 

Moved by a sudden thought, she knelt again 
in the darkness, and prayed. She asked God to 
give her years of life and service, and she arose be- 
lieving that He had heard and would answer her. 

She would not tell Leila. There was nothing to 
tell now, except that she was not strong, and 
must take good care of herself a while. 


COMMON-PLA CE: 


321 


‘‘ I think Rachel needs some new work,” Leila 
said to her husband that first night, ‘‘ and I’ve 
thought of something. She shall do what I 
wanted to do once, and you hindered : she shall 
tramp and climb in Switzerland, — she and Mint. 
She would not leave that boy, big as he is. He 
is as devoted as a lover, and she is as faithful as a 
mother. I cannot see that he is good for much 
else but to be devoted to her. And I’ll put it to 
her in this way, and she cannot refuse. I’ll say, 

‘ Now, Rachel, listen to me.’ ” And Leila button- 
holed her husband, and he was a grave, imaginary 
Rachel, and listened. ‘“You know that time I 
came to you and stayed three years, and you taught 
me how to use the other side of myself and grow 
like you,’ ” — here the imaginary Rachel opened 
his lips in protest, but her finger silenced him, — 
“ ‘ I saved my income, and it amounted to enough 
to do the loveliest thing in the world. It is yours. 
I knew I was saving it for somebody and some- 
thing ; and, if you do not take it, you will break 
my heart. It is pure gratitude, and you cannot 
refuse : it is the sweetest “thank you” I ever had 
to give in my life.’ ” 

“Do you think she will? ” asked John. 


322 


SECOND BEST, 


“ Yes. She knows me and loves me well enough 
to do it. She knows I would take it from her if 
I had helped her to be the other side of me.” 

“ She will if she tramps and reads as you do, 
and finds people to help.” 

‘‘Now you’ve said it, you splendid John,” Leila 
exclaimed, in ecstacy. “ I will help her to be the 
other side of her, — and to be like me. That is a 
stroke of genius, — to put it that way. John, my 
beloved, I am proud of you.” 

Leila did put it “that way” the next morning. 

Rachel did not hesitate one moment. It was 
such a beautiful thing for Leila to do that she was 
glad she could help her do it. Mint declared that 
the most fortunate thing that ever happened to 
him was being born Ray’s brother. 

They stayed in Switzerland three years : it had 
to be three, Leila wrote her, for that was the 
magic number. Mint became interested in toys, 
and returned to open a toy-store in Portland, hav- 
ing sold ten acres of the farm at The Foreside to a 
city gentleman for a country residence, and put 
his third and Rachel’s into his venture, which in 
time proved to be a success. 

And Rachel? What was her new work? If 


^ COMMOAT-PLA CP.' 


323 


you and I should enter that old school-room to- 
day, — the school-room where she spent her last 
day at school, — we should see a tall lady on the 
platform, carrying herself with the lithe grace of 
her school days. One of her specialties is her 
Five-minute Talks. 

Lulu Proctor’s little daughter sits at the desk 
where her mother used to sit, and makes pretty 
things on her slate. Miss Ennis thinks her mis- 
sion in life is to help girls to be cheerful and 
brave. 

‘‘ I am common-place and Rachel is second- 
best,” said Leila, merrily, to her husband, “ and 
we wouldn’t exchange with each other, or with 
anybody else in the world.” 


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